


Presentation

by White_Rabbits_Clock



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Because it's not Sherlock without them, Contracts, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Magic, Minotaurs, Unilock, Vampires, Vamplock, bodies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-09
Packaged: 2018-07-24 19:30:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 22,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7520323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/White_Rabbits_Clock/pseuds/White_Rabbits_Clock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock's a gay private school student who needs a contract to bind a protector to him and tide him over until he presents, the phenomenon that simultaneously unlocks the magic of any individual as well as determine how fuel for that magic will be obtained. Enter John, who has just murdered his father in self defense and presented as a Minotaur at the same time, and needs someone to protect so he can keep getting fuel for his own magic until he's old enough to marry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

DI Lestrade met Sherlock some years ago at the crime scene of a swimmer. Nevertheless, he’d consider this the first time he met the real Sherlock- the one that breathes and deals with his own problems and not the fae and fickle creature who sees more than the government at any given time. 

The gates of Sherlock’s private school were tall and proud and ornate black iron. The hinges, well oiled, did not creak when opened, and the drive, well guarded, did not admit many goers. Sherlock had not left through the gate, but rather through some hole no one had discovered yet in the barrier surrounding the school.

The lad was posh- that much was certain- but good at appearing anything but. For instance, he’d traded the school uniform’s navy blue dress pants for black jeans that fit well and the white starched button up and dark suit jacket had been exchanged for a black shirt and tan short jacket, both of lesser quality and rolled to the elbow and the tie had been replaced with a small watch on a rawhide string that hung beneath his clothes.

His direct gaze had been offset by a non-prescription pair of glasses with a speckled design and, in combination with his hair, he looked a bit gay and very common. Maybe someone who works at a book or maybe a goth store or a weird little mall outlet that can get away with selling glowing rocks and dreamcatchers.

As the final piece to the puzzle, aside from his voice, was that he shoved his hands into the front pockets of his well fitted jeans and sauntered a bit, hips pushing forwards slightly before the torso rather than together. It rocked the black backpack he had.

He had a black eye and his lip was split in an oddly attractive way. He’d pierced his ears, too, and one of them was scabbed over, like the earring had been scraped harshly. Lestrade pulled over to the sidewalk Sherlock was traversing and unlocked the passenger door, waiting. 

The boy, a year nine, paused and then got in. It was a civilian car. Not a problem.

“What happened?” Lestrade said without so much as a preamble. Sherlock didn’t like them; he was bad at small talk.

“They aren’t very agreeable,” Sherlock said, which is a clever way of saying nothing at all.

“I know that, but why?”

“I offend them.”

“Constantly, I’ll bet,” Lestrade grumbled, not sure if he was feeling more protective of Sherlock or hopeful that he’d finally learned a little moderation. The latter made him feel dirty. Loudmouth or not, no one deserves to get beat up like that.

“Even when I say nothing,” Sherlock responded. It was supposed to be a joke. But Sherlock’s notoriously bad at them.

“What do you mean, say nothing?” Sherlock shrugged.

“Just a joke.”

“You don’t make jokes.”

“I just did.”

“Why do they hate you that much? You’d think that they’d leave you alone if you were quiet.”

“Leave it, Lestrade.” The officer, his hair still brown and not so far removed from his own school days, instantly understood.

“What is it? Your brain? Personality? Why do they hate you that much?” Sherlock shrugged one shoulder. Then it hit him. Why go for an alternate style that made you look not entirely straight if that is, indeed what you are?

“Are you gay, Sherlock?” Silence. Lestrade nods and sits back.

“That’s a hate crime, you know.”

“What are you going to do? Arrest every bleeding idiot in the place for hate crime when they have a perfectly solid alibi in the fact that if I haven’t deduced them, I’ve probably deduced their friend?”

“Sherlock, this can’t go on.”

“Really? Because the last time I checked, word travels fast. You arrest one, and the whole school is now twice the enemy it was before. You leave, and things get worse than they were if you had just stayed away. I leave, and, well, everyone’s got a cousin somewhere. They’ll find out.”

“I’m sorry, kid.”

“My name is Sherlock, and I didn’t ask you to be.” Silence ensued for most of the ride, and then:

“You need a contract.”

“I know. That’s why I’m dressed like this.”

“You think you’ll find one?”

“Probably not. No one likes my personality. Next block.” Sherlock said, hand resting on the buckle.

“I’ll keep an eye out. Every now and then someone comes through the station who needs a little help in that area, too.” Sherlock looks at him for the first time since he got into the car.

“Thank you.” Then he got out and walked away.

It was the first and last time for a long time that Lestrade would ever hear the words.

Six months later, when Sherlock had fresh bruises and he couldn’t sleep on one side for the tenderness, Lestrade found himself sitting across from a blonde boy in much the same state.


	2. The First Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John meets the headmaster.

The kid’s face hadn’t been that fleshless the last time Lestrade had seen him, a little over a week ago. Now it looks like he’s in need of a feast. Which he is, of course, but not the physical kind. He needs a magical feast; he needs to find the fuel for the otherworldly fire that each and every one of them possess.

The lunch time duty he pulls in the nurse’s office isn’t cutting it, unfortunately. When John Watson’s magic manifested, it did so with a vengeance and a matching appetite. Luckily for him, Lestrade’s hit on an idea. 

“Hullo John. How are you?” The kid’s a year nine student, and the winter holiday is almost upon them all, which will end John’s frankly insubstantial visits to the nurse to help and, therefore get the energy he needs.

“Fine, sir. You?”

“Aye. Listen. I have a solution.”

“What kind of solution?”

“To your problem. There’s a kid who gets picked on a lot. He’s your age, and if you can get past the personality, it could save you until you graduate.” John looks at him warily.

“Personality?” A nod, and then he’s being shown a picture on Lestrade’s phone. The kid’s pale with dark, curly hair and speckled glasses. He’s wearing a button down, skinny jeans, and big leather boots you’d wear to work. All of this is in black, right down to the backpack.

“Yeah. Would you be interested in meeting him?” Well, he doesn’t have much of a choice, does he? John nods. Just then, Lestrade’s phone begins to ring. 

“Yeah? No. No, just put him in an interrogation room. I’ll be there in a bit. For god’s sake, don’t hurt him. I’m on my way.” Lestrade hung the phone up.

“Want to meet him now?” John nods, and ten minutes later, they’re braving traffic. John rubs his finger and thumb together, trying to calm his nerves.

The kid is bruised round one sharp cheekbone, and John thinks he may have bled from the mouth. Lestrade opens the door, admitting John into an interrogation room. He doesn’t take a seat, just watches. Even rumpled as he is, the kid is posh, expensive school uniform well fitted to his shoulders, school bag a dark, well taken care of leather. He cocks an eyebrow at John.

“Poor,” he begins, “with an abusive, homophobic father. Looks like you took the brunt of that in place of someone else. Not your mum, I’ll bet. Probably a brother. And you tried so hard to protect him that your magic formed around the urge. How fitting.” John does not flinch. He had been warned.

“Rich,” he responds, “with few siblings, if any, and none close to your age or interest. Very, very smart, but with no common sense, hence the bullying.” Sherlock rolls his eyes.

“Surface stuff.”

“Isn’t it all?” For a moment, they just look at each other and then: 

“Take a seat.”

“No.” Sherlock gives him a smile; a sharp, amused smile.

“You know, every now and then Lestrade has his uses. I assume he thinks we could help each other.”

“Yes.”

“And he thinks you’re up to the job.”

“Yes.”

“Did he tell you about the entire situation?”

“No.”

“I go to a boarding school during the school year and get around during the breaks. They don’t play nice and they don’t stop for stupid, so I hope you’re as smart as you look.”

“Who’s they?”

“Students, mostly. They’ve taken to fighting in groups, the cowards.” John nods.

“I can fight. And I can take on anything you have to throw at me.”

“Science experiments after hours.”

“Easy.”

“What if I burn your things?”

“Then you’re replacing them.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then we’ll see.”

“What if I run off?”

“I’ll be running after you.”

“You don’t have a problem switching schools? Moving into the dormitories? Taking the brunt of the bullying? Going to crime scenes?”

“A bunch of kids who only fight in groups is nothing I haven’t seen before. It’s not like I have anywhere better to stay, I’m trying to be a doctor, and I might as well lose the problem-with-gore thing, and my school’s pretty subpar anyways,” John finishes. Sherlock grins, teeth gleaming for a second and yes, he definitely bled.

“Then you can start today.”

 

…

 

Contrary to Sherlock’s statement, John did not, in fact, start that day, but he did start in two days, after a short contract that, in short, stated that he and Sherlock would have a trial period of one and a half months, which covers both the winter break and the time preceding it, and, if John truly is up for it, they would sign a longer one, lasting until the end of the year, and then decide if they would sign until the end of year twelve or take it by the year.

The following day, John was given a placement test, his paperwork signed by Lestrade, since he is the one facilitating everything and given a ride to his place, where he packed what items he had in two suitcases and all the books in a big black backpack.  The text- and library books turned in, both his lockers cleaned out, and his favorite teachers given a final goodbye.

Midafternoon rolls around by the time John gets out of Lestrade’s car. At the top of the steps of a wide building four stories tall stands a distinguished looking woman with short white hair and the sort of wrinkles that only makes her look better, not worse. She practically glides down the steps.

“Mister John H. Watson, correct?” John nods, one suitcase in the right hand and the other in Lestrade’s. He shakes the woman’s hand.

“My name is Vivian Crane. I’m the headmaster.” John nods.

“Nice to meet you,” he says clearly. The woman turns and leads them inside the building.

“This is the West Wing, one of four dormitories the school has. It’s the housing for the Year Nine students. Mister Holmes has a room on the top floor,” she says, leading John through a large entry way and to an elevator.

“Now, the schedule,” Ms. Crane says as she holds her hands in a matronly way. To John, she is exactly what he thought a headmaster would look like, right down to the modest silver bulbs in her ears that gleamed softly in the light. “The school hours start at 8 and end at 3 every Monday through Friday. Breakfast is held at 7, lunch at 12, and dinner at 6 every day of the week. There are vending machines that may only be perused during lunch and after hours for those who find themselves still hungry. Dorm checks are done at 10, lights out at 11, and no one is to be off campus during the week,” she says as the doors open, gently expelling them into a well lit hallway. The floor’s stone masonry stand gleaming from a fresh cleaning, and there is neither trash nor smudge to be found about the place’s benches or heavy cast-iron tables set between the doors. 

They begin to walk down the hallway.

“The halls are cleaned by the staff at 1:20 every weekday, and at 6:00 a.m. on weekends. Do not lay pranks for them. It can cost you greatly. As for the rooms themselves, the boys are expected to keep them clean, with checks being done every three weeks. Laundry is collected every Wednesday  and Sunday, and returned on Thursdays and Mondays. I don’t suppose you’ll remember any of that, so it’ll be in the student booklet.”

Now, the headmaster sticks a gold key into the lock of room D18 and opens it to reveal a great deal of books and papers and school paraphernalia, the epicenter of which appears to be a desk which sports a laptop port in the middle, the space in front of it cleared off, its lost contents likely stored in the schoolbag of one Sherlock Holmes.

Aside from the desk and chair is its empty twin, sitting with two feet of space to either side of a small window, a twin bed pushed against each of the walls to John’s left and right, the former unmade, the latter perfectly so, and a single closet with identical sides, one of which is bare, and the other of which is full of clothing and shoes. There is a basket on both sides, one full of clothing, the other bare. Next to the closet is a small bathroom which again, has been half cleared. In fact, all of the mess seems to be contained to the left side of the room and closet and bathroom.

The only difference is the location of the doors, both of which are located on John’s side of the room, and the couch, which takes up where the doors would be on Sherlock’s side. John hauls his suitcases in and sets them next to the bed, dropping the backpack on top of it.

He turns just inside to see the headmaster nod.

“To my office.” The walk to the main building, which has the grand furnishings of an 18th century mansion or a very posh hotel on the first floor, complete with plants a quietly trickling indoor fountain, and a maze of offices on the second and, lastly and most grandly the Memory Hall on the third floor, which the trio pass on the scenic route to the headmaster’s office, no doubt the grandest of all the board member’s offices.

The door opens to… a very minimalistic, sleek, sharp space. A black desk with a glass top sports a neat stack of papers, a computer at its dock, and a small pen basket, whose pens still possess all of their caps. Behind the desk sits a single, cushy swivel chair of shiny black leather, while to simplified versions take up the space in front of it. To either side of the desk, pressed against the corners, are two filing cabinets, and black shelves along either wall hold a very, very wide variety of books. John spots Dean Koontz, J. R. R. Martin, The Hobbit and the Half Bad series, along with classics and poems. Keats. Wolfe. Shel Silverstein. There are biographies centered around figures like Chopin, a full, illustrated version of the body’s anatomy, the DSM-5, and more. Say what you will about the woman in front of him, but she’s very well read.

The three of them take seats, and there is a moment that she seems to be evaluating the both of them and then: 

“Now, the most common question I get about the school is why it takes 14 to 18 year olds, rather than only secondary or only college students. The answer is this: there is better preparation, better encouragement to go on, if there is familiarity in continuing education. Students get a better feel for the workload of those beyond secondary, and more of them make something of themselves. The method is not foolproof,” at this, John feels like she’s speaking about people like him; interlopers here on contract, rather than the white collared kids with their heavily moneyed parents who will go on to “make something of themselves” even if they are truly nothing.

“Which is why I’m going to be honest with you for a moment. I like you, Mr. Watson. You did well on the placement test, as well as by my own sensibilities. From what I can gather, you are easygoing, likeable, and a team player; the perfect match for the frankly acerbic Mr. Holmes. But you need more than likeability. Things will not be easy for you; you are a fish out of water, protecting another fish who can’t swim with his own group. For this reason, know that, so long as you act with integrity and honesty, I will always hear you out. I want you succeed, not just for yourself, but for those of your presentation and your situation. Too many times do kids like you- smart, capable, talented- fall back into the same patterns which had thrown up barriers to their natural light in the first place.

“Nevertheless, this will not protect you should you lose your morals or wits. I am happy to have you here, but don’t think I won’t make you leave. Now, this is your student handbook, your schedule, your roomkey, and your uniforms. Remember: breakfast at seven, class at eight. Good luck, Mr. Watson.” John rises and nods.

“Goodbye Ms. Crane. Detective Lestrade.” Then he’s headed out of the office, back through the collection of the school’s achievements, down through the administrative offices, through the lobby, and out into the sunshine. Then a bell- a real, live bell, begins to ring. He looks around and sees a clock tower, the sound emanating from there, and laughs. Posh gits. Still, better here than back home with his father.

He sets out across the lawn things in his arms, headed back towards the dorms. Classes are out for the day. Time to see how truthful his new partner was about his habits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wipes forehead. That was fun. What do you guys think?


	3. The Weapon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John takes his final exam.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise there's actual vamplock in here. Just give me a second. Let me know what you think!

The first day is a madhouse. Breakfast is indeed at seven, but John and Sherlock both are up at six fifteen to beat the crowds. The noise and volume and sheer amount of curse words reminds John of the last day of saturday of the summer, when most of his school gathered for the biggest party of the year in order to squeeze out the last drops of fun to save up for the coming year. 

Not only that, but every now and then, food starts flying and John just sits through it all, wondering how in the hell anyone has this much energy at fucking seven. He leans towards Sherlock and asks the question.

“Because they’re going to spend several hours decidedly not being able to use said energy,” Sherlock answered back as they took both tea and coffee, eggs and bacon, sausage, and, for John, mash. He nodded. Understandable. 

At seven fifty, the two rose with their trays, and Sherlock walked John to the first class of the day- Homeroom. They took seats in the back, and Sherlock whispered what John should know about everyone.

“Laurel’s pretty hot and cold, so if she hits on you, don’t do it.”

“Andy’s a brown nose and a gossip, so be friends at your own risk.”

“Delta’s gay, so don’t even think about it.” 

“Professor Stross is looking for a pet. He doesn’t like the one he’s got.”

“Who’s he got?”

“Miles. Tries to hard. Kissup. Stross doesn’t like him.”

“Victor’s the golden boy, and you know how that goes.”

“I do.”

“Good Morning, class! Look alive, not at your phones, and pay attention. We have a new student. Mister Watson?” John sat up straight and nodded solemnly.

“You can all get to know him later. For now: Cara, do you want to keep that phone?” the man says, setting down a stack of green paper that begins to circulate. The professor is skinny and tall, like Sherlock, only infinitely more friendly. John sensed that he took just as little bullshit, though.

“Now, there’s four weeks to midterm, and then it’s Break. The next four weeks will be spent studying. Choose wisely what you’d like to look at and rank them in order of importance.” Stross says as the flyers finally reach him and Sherlock. 

Printed in black on pale green paper is the complete list of practice tests available and when. John blinks, pulls out a pen, and begins consulting his schedule. He’ll need to take at least four of these tests once.

He pulls out his CLEP report and begins to consult it. He’s weakest in the Theory part of Magic Theory and Technique, followed by a shoddy grasp of history, and fairly average hold in english. He removes the laptop he’d bought with the money left over after they took out the debts and everything else from what they got from selling the house and cashing in on the life insurance. 

Turning it on, he begins to assemble a plan, Sherlock watching the whole time. At six classes a day and eight in total, he’ll have four classes that go every day. According to his schedule, that’s homeroom, mathematics 101, english 101, and biology 101, with Magic 101, Gym, Art 101, and Health 201 switching off every other day. Every course is an hour long, as is lunch, with school getting out at three, and, in order to get up on time every morning, the end of John’s day at ten each evening. There are seven hours between the end of school and the end of the day, and he’ll need at least an hour every day to do his homework, and then another to study. The practice tests are held after school every day for an hour and a half which leaves roughly three and a half hours to John if he manages his time right. 

He’s not sure how much of a wrench Sherlock will throw into things, but he’s hoping that he’ll be able to get through without actually taking all eight of his practice tests, since John’s contract requires his presence any time Sherlock’s in significant danger. He also has to get a job, so… he’s kind of fucked, but maybe he can tutor other kids or work in the library or give blood or plasma. They pay you to do that, too. He could probably get a weekend thing going, but Sherlock’s probably going to require large chunks of his time on the days when he’s not bound to his classes. 

John spends the rest of the period looking up the jobs that allow you to study as you do them and other possible solutions to his time crunch. He jumps when the bell rings and frantically starts to put everything away.

“You should set a five minute reminder. So you don’t struggle again,” Sherlock says as he retrieves the green flyer that had fallen off the desk without John’s notice and hands it to him. John puts it in with the schedule.

“Ah… thank you.” As they walked out the door, Sherlock turned to the right, headed down the hall, rather than towards the staircase.

“Math is on the first floor, English the second, Science the third, etc.” Sherlock says. John nods and turns to him.

“So you’re going to the second floor?”

“Mm, no. I’m going to the college building, because most of my classes are over there.” Sherlock says as he turns and walks off with a wave. John wonders if Sherlock knows how charismatic he is. 

On the surface, anyways.

Sure enough, Sherlock was acerbic and strange. But he wasn’t outright hostile. John can work with that. In fact, he hardly had actual problems at all with Sherlock’s personality or habits; he was a very ritualistic boy. A pair of earplugs worked for sleeping, headphones when he wasn’t. Getting a second laundry basket worked for the overflow of clothes, and a plastic sheet under one corner of the closet worked when one of them got soaked. Their things didn’t mix- no acid on the blankets or pens falling into experiments.

Sherlock himself was fairly easy to deal with, if one had an acceptance for all things different. It was the magic that turned out to be the problem. 

Sherlock was unpresented, and John had turned into a fully formed minotaur, sword, shield and all, on the moment of his. Which means that Sherlock was sent to the first track magic class- Theory and History- while John went to the second track class- Theory and Technique. 

Within a month, Sherlock had outpaced the entire class and the two successive classes and was bridling for a challenge, but he couldn’t go further. He just didn’t have the magic for it. Which pissed him off. And guaranteed that he would directly up John’s ass about what he learned and how he did and if he’s getting stronger. 

Right in the middle of exam week. For the duration of said exams, John sleeps hard and tests harder, looking at everything he possibly can, trying to just score high enough to continue. He’s flipping through a list of techniques concerning Summoning, when his laptop lid is slammed shut, cutting off his music.

“Sherlock!”

“What did you DO!?” Sherlock says. He must have been asking for quite a while, as he’s fairly yelling it at John now.

“None of your business!”

“It IS my business, John! I’m BORED.”

“You can either shut the fuck up while I study or I can shut you up permanently.”

“Not according to our contract.” John spread his hands from where he sits cross legged on the bed.

“I’m young. I bet I can beat the backlash.” Sherlock gives him a long, hard stare, and John stares back. 

“I’ll help you pass your magic class if you show me what you’ve learned technique wise.”

“Deal.” They shook on it. 

Sherlock took his index cards and laptop and read through everything he was trying to learn, then looked up.

“Yeah, I can teach this.”

 

…

 

That friday, John clutches his bag a bit tighter; the only clue to his nerves. As per usual, he and Sherlock part outside the homeroom class, only, this time, John follows Sherlock out of the building. Today is his final exam, and the test is being held in the magic building. Sherlock glances at John as they head in the same direction. Sherlock has his math final today, and the two buildings are in the same direction.

“It’s going to be fine.”

“Says you,” John answers, voice quiet. What if he doesn’t do it right? What if he fails? Sherlock says nothing, just takes keeps walking towards the college building while John turns right to the magic one. The great doors intimidate him today, though they never have before. He drifts along on the wave of other students and into room 3213 which stands for 3rd building, 2nd floor, 13th room. He takes a seat in the back, as per usual, and waits for Professor Clyde C. Marion to walk in. The bell tolls from the clock tower at the edge of the quad, dead center between the college and secondary buildings, or 2 and 1, respectively.

John left building 1, and headed up the center walkway, away from the tower, took a left, and then entered the magic building. He passed 4, the administration building, which houses both the headmaster and the records. It took him forever to get his bearings, but it’s relaxing now to go over the directions in his head. 

Professor Marion chooses that moment to stroll in, all business and contained charisma. He dresses like an archetypal villain, and looks like one, too; all aged handsomeness and waistcoats and shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow. An oddly almost feminine piece of jewelry hangs from around his neck- a clock with odd engravings around it. 

He claps his hands together and smiles a slightly crooked smile.

“The nerves in this room are so thick I can almost taste it!” he says, and John catches a flash of white fang before it disappears. Marion is a vampire. Of course he’d make a taste joke. Nevertheless, he finds himself smiling. 

“Alright, for those of you who did not have an upperclassman to tell you how this goes, we’ll be moving in random order. I’ll give you a challenge, and you’ll be required to complete it. The extent to which you do this, along with how well it’s done, will determine your scores. Are we clear?” John nods, along with the rest of the boys. Reflexively, he tugs his tie ever so slightly.

“Clara de Lune,” the professor says. The girl- a brunette with long hair and doe eyes (one of the class’ heavy hitters)- takes her place in the middle of the circle. 

“A parakeet,” the man finishes. There is a moment of utter stillness as the class watches to see what their forerunner will do, and then a dozen parakeets appear from midair.

“I do believe I said a parakeet, Miss de Lune.” It looks like Clara will let the mistake get the best of her, and then the birds all merge into one. The professor nods, writes something down, and then: 

“Very good. Take a seat, please.” One by one, each of the students perform their task with varying degrees of success until:

“John Watson.” His heart beating hard, he takes the place of the others. He can feel eyes on his back, burning into his school jacket, grading him before he’s even been tested.

“Summon your weapons, but not your form.” John closes his eyes, remembering how it felt to hold that huge swords in one hand, the shield in the other. What it would feel like in his much smaller body. He remembers how well it was balanced, the graceful slide of air as it cut down towards it’s target. The wash of red and the rolling head and the utter taste of triumph on his minotaur’s tongue and then-

John drags himself back to reality to find the thing clutched in his hand. His weapon. Brought into being the same day his father was taken out of it. He looks at the professor, who’s got this strange expression, but only briefly.

“Very good. Take a seat.” John sits down, sword on the desk, wondering what Marion could possibly have felt warranted such a troubling look. 


	4. The Beginning of Break

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys get settled in for the break.

Sherlock smokes, and John tells him not to, and he does it anyways. That’s basically his life in regards to his partner and roommate. Sherlock nags at John to tell him things about his magic class before he does his homework, John tells him to leave him alone, he does it anyways. On this particular day, John does not have the energy to tell Sherlock to not to. He just shoves his hands into his pockets and drifts, staring off at the stars as Sherlock releases thin silver strands of smoke. 

Sherlock glances at him and knows he needs a long nap. They have successfully made it through the finals, and this is the last night here. Then it’s winter break. John just wants to sleep, but Sherlock’s brother has set them up an apartment in the city, and the two will be staying there since John has no home and Sherlock’s parents are homophobic and wouldn’t like the idea that Sherlock’s found someone who thinks he’s… not repulsive and that said person sleeps in Sherlock’s room every night. 

“You found a job?”

“Donating blood. Vampires are in short supply, lately,” John says as he opens his eyes and stares at one of the few London winter nights in which the stars are visible. 

“Aren’t you cold?” John shakes his head. He was fine. He had his uniform on. Sherlock finishes his cigarette and stubs it out before looking at John, who looks back just as evenly. 

“What?”

“I don’t know if your homophobia is genuine or born out of fear for your sister and of your father.” John tenses.

“I’m not homophobic.” He isn’t concerned with who other guys are in bed with because it doesn’t apply. He isn’t dating. Isn’t even thinking about it. So Sherlock’s- and everyone else’s- sexuality does not matter.

“From your father, then,” Sherlock says as he offers a hand.

“I’m not homophobic,” John says as Sherlock pulls him to his feet. The other boy pulls sharply and unexpectedly, ending John just a few inches from his mouth. He freezes. Sherlock winks.

“No, but you are afraid.” Then, he repeals his gaze and saunters back inside. John gives himself five minutes to digest what he said, then follows. 

Goddamn nosy ass fuck.

 

…

 

The last day of school before the winter break sees John and Sherlock with their backs turned to each other, packing.

“You’ll like it, John. The landlady knows me because I made sure her husband got hanged ‘cause he murdered their kid and their kid’s friend and my tutor and Miss Hudson’s friend and helped her get out of her husbands business-”

“What was the business?”

“The dirty kind. It was interesting to comb through it. The man was a clod, but no slouch when it comes to making money.”

“And his wife will be our landlady.”

“‘Course! She’s the only one who would conceivably put up with me.” Sherlock says as he kneels next to the power strip and checks his phone, mp3 player, and laptop. Full charge. He unplugs the laptop and stuffs it in its case before putting it with the rest of the bags. John hefts one of his and one of Sherlock’s and begins the long, treck to the front door, where a black car awaited them. 

The driver of said car got out, approached him, and says: “Mister John H. Watson?”

“Yes.”

“I’m to take you to the apartment.”

“Yessir.” the man takes John’s bag.

“The elder Holmes wishes to speak with you.” the man says with a jerk of his head before he turns and stuffs the baggage into the trunk. John swallows his sudden anxiety and climbs into the car. 

“Master Watson. Good to finally meet you.”

“Hullo.” John says, voice even and a little bit dead. This “other Holmes” looks at him for a moment, as if assessing whether or not he’s going to push the semblance of geniality. Evidently, the answer is “no”.

“Well, to make a long story short, I have an offer.”

“What offer?”

“I want you to watch Sherlock. Give me details on how he’s doing. Do that, and you’ll find extra pounds in your account. On a regular basis.” John gives the redhaired, bespoke man a long look, and then:

“No.”

“Any figure you want.”

“I want you to go piss yourself.” Then John was climbing back out of the car to get the rest of his luggage. When he gets back to hte room, Sherlock’s bouncing at him.

“Did he try to bribe you?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you say no?”

“Yeah.” Sherlock deflates a little.

“Pity. We could have split the fee between us and carried on a little farce until he figured it out.” Sherlock says as he turns away. John rolls his eyes and collects more bags. They have a move to complete.

The flat they go to is much like the room they left, only no rigid boundary is kept. Papers, books, and objects Sherlock seems to be collecting lay in stacks all around John, and, with John’s help, Sherlock quickly finds and sets up all of the lab equipment, including what he brought for school. The only places where John’s fairly clean habits thrive is in his bedroom, which he’s given a key for by Miss Hudson, the fridge, which has dividers for food and experiments, and the bathroom, where the bottles, toothbrushes, etc. stand side by side. 

John sits crosslegged on a beanbag, while Sherlock sprawls like a lazy cat across a couch you could sink into. The two have takeout containers and tea in front of them and the telly tuned to a newer movies called The Imitation Game.

“He looks like you,” John says of the main character. Awkward like Sherlock, too. He can practically feel the simultaneous eye roll and agreement. 

 

…

 

Early the next morning, at just before seven, Sherlock shoots out of the brick brown door of 221B, a winter-wrapped John behind him. Sherlock throws up an arm, and, a few minutes later, a cab pulls over to the side of the road. 

They sit in the back, John shivering in a too-thin coat and Sherlock bouncing his leg in an anxious manner. 

“Where to, lads?”

“Lauriston Gardens.” The man nods and pulls off.

“Why do we have to be out so bloody early?” John grumbled, too cold to be happy.

"Because nobody else is, so shush."


	5. Lauriston

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys go exploring.

Cold winter air stings the cheeks of the two boys as they climb out of the cab and into the steel grey morning that speaks of an afternoon storm. In easy exuberance, Sherlock bounces off down the narrow pathway. Collections of plants bloomed in their carefully cultivated dirt nests and spilled out slightly onto bumpy pebbledash. 

John, too cold in his thin jacket, stops when Sherlock pauses to admire a beautiful plant and closes his eyes, concentrating. He remembers what it had felt like with his fur. It’d been like skin, only warmer. Sensations were muted, often reduced to pressure. It was hard to tell temperature and-

“John!” he opens his eyes to discover that not only has he shifted into a furred form, but he’d also manifested four-fingered hands. Sherlock was staring at him with a mix of envy and admiration.

“I can’t wait to present.” He said. John shrugged his shoulder, choosing not to point out that the moment Sherlock presented was the moment he wouldn’t need John anymore, and would mark the boy’s return to the facility they kept kids like him in. Murderers like him don’t get placed in temporary homes.

For the rest of the visit, John follows Sherlock around as he carefully stores bits of plants in a series of small plastic baggies that he stashes inside his coat. By midmorning, Sherlock’s fascination with this plant or that one has been eclipsed his energetic brain, and he’s bundled both of them back into the cab. After a short stop at the flat in which Sherlock carefully deposits his stolen plant samples in the refrigerator, they take a short walk to the restaurant of an aging, rotund, italian man with a love of suggestion and food.

John finds the former out the hard way when Sherlock bounces over to the man for a hug and is promptly asked if John is his  _ amore _ or, if not, his  _ facino _ . At first, the words fall on Sherlock’s unaffected ears and John’s deaf ones. The boy only blushes hard when he finds out that amore means love and that facino means fascination. Sherlock smirks at him and stabs at his fettucini. 

“He’s right, you know.”

“About what?”

“You are fascinating.” Now its John’s turn to roll his eyes.

“I turn into a large talking buffalo, and you think that’s fascinating.”

“No. It’s that you murdered your father. It’s very hard for minotaurs to kill their family members. Even ones like your father.”

“I had no love for him. It wasn’t difficult.” Sherlock shrugs one shoulder and wipes his mouth.

“If you say so.” And John does say so. He remembers that morning was a lot like one.

 

....

 

_ Cloud cover seemed a larger extension of John Sr.’s mood; approaching maximum capacity and ready to blow at any moment, yet somehow held back for lack of a catalyst. It was not a natural condition, but one the younger of the two Watson children had carefully cultivated. John, at fifteen, was no looker in any respect, and that was to his advantage. People, his father perhaps most importantly, tended to think him an extension of his face- average. Neither stupid nor smart, and incapable of plotting. _

_ He had used this to his advantage and, in the early morning of yesterday, had snuck Harry out through a window in the bathroom and then proceeded to take his shower. What had followed was more than twenty four hours of peace; the house had become an adequate place to take the blast of their father’s temper. _

_ Unfortunately, not all of John’s plans worked well. This one failed due to Harry’s girlfriend, a high minded, fairly well moneyed girl whose fascination with Harry’s own dour existence had faded with  time, leading her to demand more than what Harry could give and ending in a disastrous breakup, breakup sex, and then Harry’s full fledged flight back to the only place she could find a room in which she wouldn’t be bothered. She’d slowed up a couple blocks away and fixed her hair and her face in the bathroom of a gas station before walking calmly into the front door and through the living room.  _

_ As she was going down the hall, a smear of purple lipstick had show out against the edge of her collar. _

_ “You’re gay.” Their father had said when he spotted the lipstick from his perch on the chair. Harry had stopped. The vent that runs from John’s room to the living room had him stop too. _

_ “...Yes.” Harry had said after a moment. The break up had worn her down. She couldn’t think of a good excuse or even a bad one. She was just too tired to keep up the charade. _

_ “That’s disgusting.” Harry didn’t move. Sometimes, when he attacked her like this, it stopped right here, with a single phrase of condemnation. Sometimes it went much farther. Her father heaved himself out of his chair, face red with liquor, and lumbered across the room. Belatedly, Harry realized that, if facing the hallway, five feet to the left was the kitchen. Had she stopped at the entrance to the house, maybe she would have been fine. As it was, John Sr.’s poison of choice and his daughter was in almost the same direction.  _

_ At the invisible point in which he’d have to choose between the two, he took the right path until his failing, meaty body was directly in Harry’s face. He was no slouch when it came to the genes, so he was big and tall with a strong forehead and jaw, thin lips and clear blue eyes. Harry was a spitting image, with the exception of her being beautiful, while John looked a weird mix betwixt him and his mother that had split too long ago for John to care anymore. _

_ “What did I do to end up with a daughter like you?” the eldest Watson muttered as he stood gazing down at his daughter, who was tall like him, and willow thin like their mum. Harry just waited. It wasn’t too late to get distracted. It wasn’t to late for him to do a ninety degree turn away from her. _

_ And then it was too late.  _

_ John Watson the fourth, had the long inherited, long coveted, long feared ability to hypnotize. A long time ago, all kelpies could shapeshift into a horse form or a human one, and had powerful mesmeric abilities. The latter has stayed for the land lorn ones. _

_ “Don’t be an abomination, anymore, Harry,” he said, and, at that point, John rose and walked quickly down the hall, but remained in the shadows, silent and unnoticed as he planned in his head.  _

_ “Be straight, Harry,” he said, and then John made his move, going for the guts and the nuts, trying to break John Watson, Sr.’s concentration so badly that he would forget and give Harry enough time to get her shit and move out. _

_ What John didn’t know was that his father had grown up by the sea, and the younger Holmes found himself in battle with an intoxicated, full fledged selkie, sharp hooves up in the hair, daring John to attack, for Harry, in her slackened, mesmerized state, to remain her. John threw himself in front of his sister and charged. Horses don’t wear clothes. He knows exactly what he’s going for.  _

_ Hooves arc down and John dodges, scrambling to keep his balance on the bad shoes and fake tiles. A high neigh emanates from the horse, and John feels his mind begin to slip, so he starts to yell, counteracting the disarming whinnies with his own savage yells.  _

_ He felt his mind mist over, his point of view grow taller, his body growing slightly muted, and he knew exactly what to do with the sword he had never seen before.  _

 

…

  
He doesn’t see Harry anymore. They said John couldn’t be around her until he had better control of his abilities. They email every now and then, but between the job, the contract, and school, there’s hardly any time left for such things as Harry Watson.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that took forever. Tell me what you think!


	6. Reminder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John is reminded of why he's here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the lateness, guys. Writer's block for two other stories. This one, however, took about an hour.

Winter break is over, and this is the reason the boys return to school. John is happy with this. He doesn’t have to think about the confusing, unsolvable problems when he has to be at the blood bank or Sherlock’s side.

Unfortunately, Sherlock would prefer it the other way around. During the three weeks before break, John had nearly forgotten that the basis of their bargain was that John protect Sherlock. The other boy had needed no protecting. But that was before winter break.

It’s lunch time on the first day, in which John is wolfing down tomato soup, when he notices that he’s being watched. Or rather, that Sherlock is being watched, and not in a friendly way. But John ignores it and swabs the bowl with toast.

In English, while John is taking notes, the back of his neck starts to tingle. After a moment, he realizes what it’s for. Quietly, he rises and slips out the classroom door, pass in hand. He doesn’t know Sherlock’s schedule yet, but something tells him that he’ll be on a floor of the uni students’ building. 

He runs across the quad, aiming for someplace he has never set foot inside of, and makes good time getting there and to an unused hallway on the to the top using the stairs. Acting on instinct, he slows down, creeping quietly up the last few steps and easing the service door open. There, he realizes what he snuck out of class for when he pokes his head around the corner the width of the door away..

Sherlock’s backed against a corner, fists up, nose already bloody, face and hands and arms already sprouting bruises. John silently sets down the pass and steps fully into the hallway. Stopping to make sure the silent door doesn’t clang in its catch.

Then he begins to move forward. As he goes, he can hear conversation.

They’re laughing at him. They’re talking about how he’s not so big and smart now, is he? They’re asking if he’s got the brawn to match the brains, or if he got the shit end of that stick. Then John loses the plot.

Years of experience keeps him from completely killing them. Instead, he steps into view ‘round the bend and makes it until he’s just ten feet away from the boys. Sherlock, he knows, has undoubtedly seen him, yet doesn’t acknowledge his existence.

“Hullo, boys,” John says cheerily. They turn around as one to look at him. John drops his hand from the little, almost dainty wave.

“You’re John Watson. The chav.” One of the boys says.

“You could say that. Or you could say you’re all daft cows. After all, he,” and here, he points at Sherlock, who is still watching the boys, “has a contract with me, and I presented as a minotaur which means you plonkers are going to be running across the quad with no bollocks if you don’t leave him alone.” Here, he gives a pretty little smile. 

The boys look at each other, and one of them glances at Sherlock. Then they start to transform, fur sprouting across their bodies and their clothes falling away and their bones and flesh twisting and cracking and reknitting them back into the bodies of a lion, a wolf, and a bear. Great.

John, who got the hint as soon as the shifting started, has already completed his own transformation.

He rams an armoured shoulder into the lion, and suffers a bite to the neck for his troubles. He shakes the animal off and smacks the bear with the flat of his blade, rendering him dazed enough for a second blow from a hoof. It leaves him unconscious.

That leaves him with an angry lion and the wolf, who darts forward, but can’t sink his teeth into flesh  far enough to down him or cleave John’s cloven hooves with sharp, dully shining claws. John kicks the wolf away and manages to land a blow to the jaw, earning him high whimpers. All that’s left is the lion, who has already scored a deep scratch across the inner thigh and the neck bite.

John charges at him, dodging the sharp maw and smacking shoulder with head. The big cat is thrown off balance, which gives John the opportunity he needs to slam the thing in the chest with one fist. He dives forward after the boy and wraps a powerful arm around a thick, gold neck and squeezes until the boy collapses from lack of air.

Like the rest, he transforms back into his human form completely starkers.

“What do you think? Should I leave them with no berries?” Sherlock smirks.

“Nah. Can’t really explain that one, yeah?” John shrugs before collecting the unconscious.

“Get their clothes,” he says. Proudly, he marches through the quad, drawing eyes of students, who are just getting out of class.

“Mister Watson! Mister Holmes!” Professor Stross calls out. John turns around to regard their homeroom teacher.

“Sir?” Sherlock asks, clothes and bags bundled in his hand.

“I understand the deal you two have going, but this,” here, he gestures to the naked arses and fully exposed genitals of the boys, “is unacceptable. Come with me.” Stross leads them back to the admin building.

Their, they take a right turn and into the bathroom. 

“John, do collect Mrs. Crane.” The whole way up and the whole way back from her office, John’s stomach churns with nervousness. What if he gets kicked out over this? What if they make him give up the contract over this? They already signed for the rest of the year, and, blase as John was about it, he doesn’t want to deal with the backlash of a broken agreement and a broken life all at the same time.

As for Mrs. Crane, she steps into the boy’s bathroom with her assistant, a little mousy woman with brown hair who blushes as red as an apple at the sight. At that point, John and Sherlock are both sent out to wait while the two conversate over the events.

John, after being called in to give his account and then Sherlock his, becomes fairly certain that they’ll be alright.

“Mr. Watson, it’s considered bullying to bring a student out naked in front of others. This one time, I will excuse your behavior, on account of you not knowing what to do with them. Know, however, that this is deplorable, and consider it your only warning. After this, I expect you to alert a teacher to your predicament, rather than taking care of it. Understand?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You two are free to go, but come to my office at four to give your statement. Understand?”

“Yes.” says Sherlock.

“Yes, ma’am,” says John. On the way out of the building, he can’t help but smile. It’s been awhile since he felt that alive.


	7. Charms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John goes to see a man about a horse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has nothing to do with anything, but did you guys notice that if the illuminati is real, we have it all wrong because they control the media (and the way they are percieved) and if they're not real, we are still speculating about a bunch of lies?

Things do not get better for Sherlock. The tormentors just get sneakier. Sherlock only narrowly avoids being hit by a bucket of water on the way into the gym to practice his fencing. At lunch he sits on something squishy in his chair which wasn’t there a moment ago. John walks him back to the dorm rooms and waits while his friend takes a shower. The room smells like shit so much that, on the way home from the blood bank, John has to buy a can of aerosol. Sherlock just looks away.

They send Sherlock emails from anonymous, fake addresses talking about how he probably takes it up the ass every night, if he likes to be choked, if he likes being the weak one. These are not things that John can take care of, and Sherlock doesn’t seem to mind.

One afternoon, John walks into their dorm room, tired to the point of exhaustion, only to get a peculiar smell from the air. He looks over and notices that it doesn’t look like a cigarette that Sherlock is smoking. 

“Put that away, Sherlock. You’re going to get us both in trouble.”

“And then what? I get kicked out and into another school by the end of the month and you go with me.”

“Sherlock, love, I’m sorry this is happening.” For this, he gets an annoyed glare.

“No, you’re not, you just don’t like to be useless. All you people want to be useful. Loved. Have friends and laugh.” He takes another hit on his joint.

“And now you’re worried, because you think I’m not going to want you unless you can stop this. Go do your homework, John. I’m working on being expelled. And I’m not your ‘love’.”

John looks at him for a moment, mad at being attacked like that, and sad at Sherlock’s apparently deep depression, and angry at the state the other Year Nines have put them in. But he can’t do anything here; can’t let Sherlock see that even his problems are not just his. He turns and walks out of the door, headed to the only place that he knows can show him what he needs.

 

…

 

Clyde C. Marion loves all kinds of music and all kinds of dance. He’s got a sword in his hand just now, his feet moving gracefully through a flamenco. His silver hair catches the lights in the ceiling, and his clothes are well fitted. John quietly waits for him to finish.

As the music draws to a beautiful, soft close, Marion turns around and his mouth and goatee shift into a smile.

“Ah, Master Watson! How’s Year Nine treating you?”

“Fine, sir,” he says, suddenly shy in the presence of the embodiment of excellence.

“Not that fine, if you’ve bothered to track me down.”

“Yes, sir. My friend… his life is not so fine, and I can't fix it.”

“And you want me to teach you some kind of magic that will solve all his problems.” 

“Not all of them. I get that this will just deal with some of the symptoms, but I’m worried that something will happen.”

“Like what?”

“Like they’ll lock him out of the dorms if I’m ever not here to let him in. They did that last night when I had to stay late at the bank. If I hadn’t gotten a call, he would have been out in the cold for more than an hour extra.

“Or they’ll poison his food. Or tear up his uniform. Or put stink bombs in our dorm. Or-” his professor raises his hand, and John falls silent.

“Alright, Master Watson. There’s no need to elaborate. I get it. Tell you what: I’m going to teach you how to make a talisman.”

“A talisman?”

“Hm hmm. You get one part, and your friend gets the other. It will… give him intuition, like there are eyes whose vision he can only sense. He’ll know when to stop. When to turn around. When to run.” John nods thrice; once slow, then two quick jerks of the head.

“Yes, sir.”

“Now, a charm like this is not easy, Master Watson. From what I’ve heard, your friend doesn’t seem to go a day without something happening to him, so it will have to be powerful. When’s the next time you’re off from work?”

“Ah… Friday.” 

“Come see me then. We’ll get started. Bring food, by the way, it could take a while.”

 

…

 

The next day, John is quiet in his classes, paying special attention to the link between him and Sherlock. It feels fuzzy when there is nothing important; a velveteen curtain blocking John from seeing things- from feeling things- that he has the ability to. John considers probing, but decides not to.

The last time one of them went probing, they almost didn’t come back.

Come Friday, he eats a little more at each meal than usual; preparation for the afternoon. As the shrill dismiss of the whistle from rugby practice rings out across the field, John turns and jogs back into the locker room, where he takes the fastest shower known to man, practically jumps back into his uniform, and walks quickly but casually across the across the field, between the tower and building 3, out through the quadrisected lawn main campus, and finally into building four. He finds his way to his classroom, where Professor Marion is waiting.

“And here I thought you’d be late,” the professor says with a smirk. It occurs to John that the vampires he’s seen don’t smile with their teeth. It doesn’t surprise him. A vampire’s teeth can be deadly.

“No, sir,” John replies, setting his bags down and taking a seat in the front row, across from his teacher. The man shakes his head.

“To the mat.” he sinks gracefully down into a cross legged position, John mirroring the look, although his hands are palm down and laying against the insides of his thighs and Marion’s are held by each other. John glances at the signet ring on his finger and gets distracted. 

They did a chapter on vampiric hierarchies before the midterm, and signet rings are really only given to those at the top or the very extraordinary. He wonders which Marion is.

“Focus, Master Watson. Everything I say is important.”

“Okay.”

“Breathe deeply. Get into the headspace from which you pull parts of your other. When you first crack the book open, they tell you that all minotaurs have two forms- one as a human and one as a humanistic animal. That is fundamentally untrue. A minotaur- indeed, all werebeings- have as many forms as they have the capacity to fully grasp. 

“Most minotaurs move through their forms gradually, in a shift that takes at least a few years before settling on what they like best. Some only ever go from one extreme to the other. Some are comfortable with the armor. The possibilities are as limitless as you are. So think, John Watson: how comfortable are you with your other half?” And John does think. He treats his abilities like something that had to be minded, cultivated, cared for, trained, but nothing more. Like a dog bred for protection, he considers his form and the work he does on it nothing more than a tool to be sharpened; not something to be loved or liked. 

Yet, he does love it. He likes the way it feels to be the tallest person in the room, yet knowing that he doesn’t even have to prove himself. He likes the metallic grind of his sword on a whetstone. He likes the warm feel of metal armor after he’s summoned it. He loves the sensation he gets right before he shifts but after the act is certain. He loves knowing that if he cares, he can protect whatever it is he has to. He-

“Watson,” the voice is sharp, this time, and John snaps open his eyes.

“You are more powerful than you know. I suggest you look into self control during any sort of meditation,” he says, that same look in his eyes from when he called his sword during the midterms.

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you see this, John?” the professor asks, lifting the little clock- the clock that John had thought was feminine in design- from around his neck, dangling it by the chain from long, graceful fingers.

“Yes.”

“This is what you want for Sherlock- a talisman to protect him in a way that nothing physical can. You want to give him an intuition even he, intelligent as he is, cannot develop on his own. For that, you need something to bestow that power on and a good grasp of the one you’ll be giving the talisman to, along with something to link it back to you. Then, you’ll need to get into your headspace and channel raw magic into the charm, along with only the intentions you wish to transmit to your friend, and an idea of how to contain all of that.”

“For those reasons: take the weekend. Look up self control and how it works when you’re unaware of yourself. Find a couple of charms- one for you, and one for your friend. The next time you’re off work, starting Monday, come see me. We’ll finish what we started here today.” John nodded and rose, as relaxed as meditation always makes him.

“Yes, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoopdie fucking whoo. It's not even that I have writer's block (although i still do) it's that my life is writing blocks into my free time (which is fan fiction time. In any case, let me know what you think.


	8. The Club

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gets a nasty little close call

Charms and talismans, John knows, are not the same thing. To simplify it, charms are all about potential. The potential to be a talisman. The potential to be great. To be loved. To be used or abused or taken care of. There is, John is beginning to suspect, no greater physical manifestation of what if than a charm. 

Talismans, on the other hand, are all about what has actually come to happen. How much of that potential actually got used- which what if comes to pass.

Which is why choosing the charm is probably the most important part of the process. Charms can be broken down into two categories: the physical and the abstract. The latter is used mainly for temporary protection or guidance on living beings, and as invisible sentries and security systems on non living ones. The former is basically a more concentrated- and more powerful- version of the latter.

A physical charm as greater longevity and potential, since all that magic has someplace to sleep until needed. Because of this, it doesn’t have to be renewed for long periods of time- sometimes never- and it doesn’t wear out or need replacing, either. It is excellent in the wear and tear department.  

On Friday, Sherlock does his usual thing- dress like the social version of himself and disappear with a backpack for the next day or two. John waits for him to pack and walks with him to the bus stop, where Sherlock gets off a stop earlier. John rides almost to the center of the city, to the biggest blood bank (and the one that pays the most money for the minotauran variety) and stays for a couple of hours, getting the food of vampires extracted. 

They pay him more if he brings himself and lets them tap directly into his vein. During the week, he gets it drawn in the nurse’s office and she freezes and keeps it for him until the runner comes on Thursdays. Then John comes here Saturdays to get drawn from at a higher price.

After that (and some food), he walks about until he comes to a touristy street with a bunch of big-windowed shops. He wanders down it, window shopping for something Sherock wouldn’t mind wearing. Would even grow to like one day, maybe (but who is he kidding? Sherlock is impossible to please). He walks the length of the shops twice, but sees nothing even remotely promising. Whatever. He has a whole city to scour. It’s okay if a tourist trap doesn’t have it.

He stays walking until he can’t anymore, then grabs the last bus back to the school and takes the trek up to the dorms on his own. While he goes, he casts a silencing spell to see if he’s gotten any better at it. Given that he’s able to slip past the night watchmen without anyone hearing him, he’s going to say he has.

He eats a granola bar (emergency food, since he missed dinner) and goes to bed early. He’s going to find that charm tomorrow, and he’ll go till his legs fall off if he has to.

 

…

 

They think he’s older; just one of those quiet lads that will beat the shit out of you if you’re dumb enough to get too near. He lets that stand. He likes this persona they’ve given him. “A quiet lad” is better than “that freak over there”. “Not much of a drinker” is another thing they think about him. And they’re right. He isn’t that much of a drinker, but only because he’s gotten more than he bargained for when he does drink.

They pump bass heavy, jarring music over the stereos, and Sherlock likes it; likes how you can forget and get lost in a subwoofer. But he‘s not here to get lost. He’s here to get found. So he watches the people; big men in tight jeans with good asses and hard muscles next to their smaller counterparts. He looks over and- ah, there he is. The only straight guy at a gay bar has just arrived on the scene. He’s sitting at the bar, like Sherlock, except Sherlock will wager that the man has used a real ID.

He looks around again, watching for anyone’s interest. Hoping that someone who wouldn’t mind him will want to fuck. He’ll settle for friends with benefits. He could always use someone to smoke a joint with every now and then. The ambiguity of contract law means that he can date someone older if there’s an intention of a signing at some point, so all he has to do is find a man here who won’t mind the wait. Sherlock can sign that contract as early as the end of this one, since it won’t be until after his birthday.

Quite suddenly, his heart lurches as his eyes land on a face he didn’t want to see. He slides of the bar stool and into the crowd, giving it up to someone else waiting to sit down. The rock of bodies hides him well enough, and he goes with the sweaty, dark, frenzied flow, checking to see if he’s still here.

He makes his way to the door, ignoring a rough squeeze to his ass, and dives out into the coatroom, through the doors, and into the night. He paid for his drink in cash, so he doesn’t have to go back. Quickly, as the temperature drops, he makes his way away from the club, heart still keeping an 8/4 beat. 

He starts walking, body shaking with the cold, ignoring a cat call or two, mind still too caught up with the fact that he saw, beyond the shadow of a doubt, Victor Trevor. The golden boy. The one who was behind more than a few pranks. The one he always avoids. And now he’s here, in Sherlock’s secret life. Threatening it. Not for the first time, Sherlock considers killing him. He could do it. He could get Mycroft to help him. He coul-

“Hey, kid!” he hears, and turns around. A man- one who’d been sitting next to him, who’d tried talking to him- is trying to catch up. Sherlock stops and waits.

“You look worried,” he says.

“I’m not a kid.”

“But you look worried. Look, let’s get something to eat. You got money?”

“Nah.”

“I do. Come on,” He says. With nothing else to do, Sherlock follows, stomach in knots. If Victor sees him- or saw him- he’s fucked. So, without further ado, he ducks into the hailed cab and waits for the door to close, still watching the club entrance he has just walked away from.

“What’s your name, again?”

“Will.”

“Well, I’m Sebastian. It’s a pleasure,” he says, offering his hand. Sherlock takes it, and immediately likes the calluses on his palms. He can tell what this man- this Sebastian- wants.

“It’s nice to meet you, too.”

 

…

 

The little shop was archetypal in every way. Dusty, stuffed interior with hundreds of odds and ends lying about in muted chaos. An old man sat hunched over at the wooden counter on a stool next to a yellowed, aged cash register. The light was dark and amber. And it held antiques.

It’s in here that John finds what he’s looking for. An anatomically correct skull and an anatomically correct heart, both gold and in good shape, lay in a beat up velveteen box whose fuzz has worn away in places. John knows that this is the best he’ll ever find. He just hopes he has enough for it.

“How much for this, sir?”


	9. The Gift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gets a present.

“Are you sure? Gold can be a fickle material to work with, as far as charms go.”

“Why is it fickle?”

“Materially valuable things tend to overshadow their magical components,” Marion says.

“This watch is naught but copper; relatively cheap. Mass produced,” he says as he removes it and hands it to John. It’s incredibly powerful; John can practically hear the long dormant, stable magic. He can certainly feel its hum as it sits in his palm. 

“Why a watch?” he asks.

“Because I was always losing mine. Truth be told, your friend and I are a lot alike. Only there were less rules, so I wound up in the infirmary a sight more,” he says, voice fond and grave at the same time.

“Did you have a contract?”

“No. It was believed back then that giving young boys contracts spoiled them to future ones. We know now that it doesn’t quite work like that.”

“But you had a talisman,” Marion smiles, taking back the watch and fingering it. 

“I fell in love. Quite the cheeky one, she was,” she murmurs. 

“So she made it for you?”

“Aye.”

“What happened to her?”

“I was wandering around one night, avoiding a mob of school boys. Ran into a vampire. Savage beast. Hadn’t fed in a few days. The next time I was aware of anything, I had that hunger. After that… well, Emelia wasn’t quite the same. The last I heard she’d taken up with a gang of her own kind and set sail. But I kept the talisman as a reminder.”

“Of what?”

“Of my humanity. And that hunger isn’t everything.” John nods and looks down at his skull and heart. Sherlock could use the reminder, probably. 

“But enough about mine,” he says, looping the chain back around his neck, “onto your’s.” 

“The trick to making a charm into a talisman is patience. Magic is fickle, and it won’t appreciate being confined to solid boundaries. So to do something like this, you have to take your time,” Marion says, withdrawing from his breast pocket a flat disk with a willow tree design stamped onto it. His hands start to glow the pale, pale green of Marion’s aura. The disk rises a centimeter and seems to absorb the light. Presently, it sinks down, looking no different.

“And now:” here he flicks the little talisman out so that it floats in midair, “it does whatever I told it to. Your turn.” John looks at his two little pieces. He’ll start with the heart.

 

…

 

Sherlock opens his eyes to gaze at unfinished ceiling and exposed rafters. He looks around, not quite remembering where he’s at yet. Abstract explosions of color hang on the walls alternatively with simple, rough sketches half painted. The furniture is a hodgepodge of second-hand saves, as is the refrigerator and microwave, if Sherlock is right. That coffee pot looks brand new. 

How rustic. 

Sherlock sits up, sore. He swings his legs over the bed and, as quietly as possible, collects his clothes and bag and steps to the bathroom. Oh, good. He’s got mouthwash. He gets dressed in record time; it’s too late in the day. If Sebastian’s not awake now, he will be soon. 

In five minutes, he’s gone, hellishly tired and hungry but no longer afraid of his discovery. The block of flats he’s walking down are all dismal. He gives it a decade before they tear this place down.

He makes his way to a little hipster looking coffee shop and into the bathroom, where he takes a moment to examine himself in the mirror. He makes quick work of covering up the hickies and bruises he sees with makeup. He’ll have to keep the bite-mark hidden though. 

In short order, he’s swapped out his button up for a turtleneck, rearranged his hair, and hooked a pair of aviators on the collar. He looks okay. Like he needs a good long sleep, but, other than that, fine.

He goes out into the cafe and buys a coffee and a croissant, which he eats at a corner table that he can see everything from. Not the best breakfast. He looks up as the door opens. Well, hell. He throws slides his money under his cup and beats a fast retreat out the back door, sliding his shades in place as he goes. Once he skirts the little coffeehouse and blends in with the traffic, he affects a different gait and tries to look more relaxed.

He does it well enough that he gets into a cab without further incident. Fucking Mycroft, always trying to run him.

When he gets back to the dorms (unchecked, thank god) John is sitting on his bed, twisting his fingers around. He’s nervous by the looks of it. Sherlock wonders if this is the day he’ll tell him that he’s changed his mind. That he doesn’t want Sherlock anymore and that at the end of the year he’ll be leaving. 

Sherlock tells himself that it’s whatever.

“Do… do you really sneak out to get laid?” John blurts out, seemingly hurt by his own words. The other boy laughs and tosses himself onto his own messy bed.

“Course not. I sneak out ‘cause I’m bored and I get laid because that’s the most interesting thing I can find. People are so boring, you know.” 

“Sherlock…”

“What, John?” he says, stretching and pretending not to care. His own heart should not be beating this hard, really.

“That’s dangerous, you know.”

“I’m well aware, oh careful one.” John shakes his head. For the first time, Sherlock notices that he’s adopted the minotauran version. He stands up and goes to his dresser, where he removes from the top drawer a small, worn box. 

“Here.” he opens the box and pulls from it a very small, golden skull.

“Oh.” Sherlock says, taking it by the chain and examining it. 

“Th…why?”

“I just thought… there’s so much I can’t help you with…” Sherlock loops it around his neck and instantly feels safer. As though not everything will kill him now.

“Thank you,” he says, lost for further words. No one’s ever given him a gift like this.

“You’re welcome.” Something seems to settle in both of them, and, while they don’t talk for the rest of the night, there is peace for the first time.

  
  



	10. Jabs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock oversteps himself a bit and John does the sneaky sneak

The end of the year draws ever nearer, with exams rushing up fast. John sits in their shared dorm room, on his bed, legs folded, hands resting on his knees, eyes closed, harem pants (that he had to think long and hard about spending the money on) and a soft, fitted t-shirt covering him, and both his body and his dreads floating independently of each other.

His strong minotaur’s heart beats a steady rhythm as he opens his eyes, gold striations glowing faintly within them, nose every so often flaring slightly at this or that scent wafting over from the other side of the room. He doesn’t look away from his roommate, fairly interested in what he’s doing, as he raises one hand, extending it ever so carefully past his knee. 

“ Surgere,” t hings begin to raise up off the floor. 

“Iungo,” a spilt water bottle and its liquid and cap rise and right themselves, landing gently on the corner of John’s desk, ostensibly drinkable, now. 

“ Sed creverunt,”  today’s uniform, sodden with rain water, rises and twists, water falling out and freely drifting. A loose pencil, a dumped backpack, an open textbook and half lost homework return themselves to their correct spots. Eventually, the room is still again, and John closes his eyes, hand returning to it’s resting place.

Sherlock silently throws his own, quite unspilled water bottle at him. John doesn’t even flinch, easily catching it in one hand and floating it to sit next to his own.

“You’re no fun at all.”

“And you enjoy being a pest too damn much.”

“You’re the one practicing your magic in front of me.”

“Self control,” John says, unwilling to take the discussion further.

“Oh, and I’m sure you just have so much of it.” John looks at him, uncharacteristically furious. Because hinting at his fucking father is oh so mature.

“Excuse me,” he says, suddenly coming up out of his position and walking to the closet. He scoops his school stuff out of his bag and replaces it with a couple sets of clothes and his toilettries, wallet, phone, a charm and two talismans he has gotten better at them since the skull). In five minutes, out the door, calling back a “venio” for his shoes and socks to follow him.

“Joh-” but the door cuts off anything Sherlock may have said. 

John stalks like some strange panther down the hallway, striations still faintly gold.  It’s Friday. He can be gone for two days before anyone but Sherlock will miss him. He walks to the bathroom, opens the window, and spirits himself out over the cold, frosty plain of the school property.

“Harry,” he says as the line picks up with a “hello?”

“Where’ve they got you?”

“Aunt Lilly.”

“Who?”

“Da’s sister.”

“Oh. Wanna sneak out?”

“I don’t have a way…”

“She there now?”

“Yeah. Sleeping.”

“Give me the address and get ready,” John says. He puts it into his phone as soon as it comes through on the text.

In thirty minutes, he finds himself approaching the block of flats Harry now lives in. 

“Indespectus,” he murmurs as he touches down gently. He more floats than flies over the complex but floats along once he’s inside, muscles warm underneath his coat and scarf. Not even his breath is visible as he looks at the apartment numbers. Oh. There. Thank god. The corner apartment- the apartment with not one but three windows- is the one that Harry lives in. Slowly and carefully, he removes one talisman from his bag and drapes it around his neck. 

“Patet…” he murmurs. He can see that no one is there as the door turns see through for John. Whoever Aunt Lilly is, she either has some very shitty magic or she has entirely too much for John to get away with. Either way…

“Unlock,” he says, talisman invisibly glowing as the door slowly unlocks. He pushes it open and disappears inside, settling in the corner to wait. Presently, as the hour draws to a close, one person creeps carefully into the living room. John murmurs that it’s him. Once she gets a feel for where he’s at, she leads him back to her bedroom, where, with a quick spell of silence, John gets them through the lock.

They wind up sitting on a rooftop somewhere in the middle of London, frozen air wafting hard and steadfastly against them, battering the bubble of warmth John’s created sheltering them.

“That’s a low blow,” she murmured, in response to Sherlock’s jab about his father.

“Yeah.”

“You gonna ignore him?”

“Nah. It wouldn’t be the first time, and it certainly won’t be the last,” he says.

“I miss you,” she comments, eventually, leaning against him. 

“Yeah. I miss you too.” It feels like it’s been a long, long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, creatures. Feel free to let me know what you think.


	11. Her Hopes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock tries to explain why John can't come with him over the summer by telling him about the years surrounding his birth.

Finals come like midterms did and, at the end of it, when John and Sherlock are laying on their beds, done with the exhaustive week and with another month until summer break and just taking the time to enjoy it. They’ll get their scores during the third week.

“I don’t want the year to end,” Sherlock says into the dark. John rolls onto his back. The ceiling gazes back down at him, impassive as ever.

“Why not?”

“Because I have to go to Mother’s house.”

“What’s wrong with going home?”

“Mother’s house, and I don’t… associate with my family unless I have to.”

“Why?”

“I just don’t,” Sherlock says.

“I don’t have anywhere to be. Maybe I could come with you.”

“No.”

“Okay.” If Sherlock takes John to Mother’s house, then they’ll realize the truth.

“They… don’t like me.”

“Why not? Aside from, you know,” John says, indicating Sherlock’s mercurial moods.

“They don’t like gays.”

“Oh.” he doesn’t know what to say about that. It’s not like the shit hasn’t been done before, but there’s a difference between a drunk has-been with nothing to do and Sherlocks very monied, very prestigious family. 

“Or me. In general.”

“There’s more to it?”

“Mother… wishes I would be a more perfect person.” Sherlock says, looking at John in the dark, even though he can’t see him. 

“Perfect how?”

“Just perfect,” Sherlock answers, the whole story on the tip of his tongue. But he doesn’t know what John will do with it. He could reject him- affirm his mother’s ambitions, or he could hold it over Sherlock’s head, or he could simply decide he didn’t care and like Sherlock all the more for it. The boy doesn’t know.

“Well, if you want to give the whole story, I’m here.”

“Can I sleep in your bed?” Sherlock asks, testing John.

“... Yeah. Come on, then.” The taller boy drags his comforter and pillow onto John’s mattress and settles down very close to him, on top of John’s blanket but under his own. He waits a few minutes and then speaks.

 

…

 

_ Mother was used to excellence long before I was born. She was taught to be a sweet girl, a quiet teenager, and a wonderful woman. She married an ambitious, yet kind man. She had a prestigious home and perfect life and flawless reputation and massive bank account and admirable career.  _

_ She was, according to her parents and to her, extraordinary in all the ways that one wants to excel, and average at the rest (which was just excellent, to her). As such a person existed, it stood to reason that those genes should definitely be passed on to at least two children. _

_ So as the months went by and her belly got bigger and her feet swelled up and standing got harder to do, she thought excellent thoughts about her child. She determined that the little head nestled inside amniotic fluid would one day protect a brilliant, sparkling locus of intellect and magic.  _

_ She thought this as her own abilities (which had run a bit rampant with the strain upon her) made the plants outside the house grow big and strong and wild. She thought this as her husband (the first one, anyways) hired her an assistant who spent most of her days quietly accomplishing Mother’s task when she got too tired to do it herself. She thought this all the way up until it was time to birth the baby, and she could think no more. _

_ She was right, too. My older brother was easily moulded into the kind, quiet, unintrusive child she wished to see that harbored a razor sharp mind underneath that exterior. All she had to wait on was the magic and the career. When she (and he) got those things, the child with his father’s face would be her perfect descendent. _

_ Perfection, unfortunately, does not last. Ambition and kindness had won Mr. Simon Holmes a wife, but his temper had waxed over the course of years into something ugly and dangerous; his wife was obsessed with flawlessness, and the successful fantasy writer was not flawless.  _

_ So when the complaints began to roll in, his sanity rolled out to make room. _

_ On the day when she complained that he was filling her darling child’s head up with too many fantasies (Mycroft was three) and not enough vocabulary. He told her that she should have thought of that before she married him. _

_ When she told him he was spending too much time playing ball with his friends and not enough time attending balls with his colleagues, he told her to remove the stick from her arse. _

_ When the eight rejection letter for his latest novel (the main character of which was, curiously enough, a glass figurine based on a certain real-life woman) he flat out told her to “shut the fuck up. You want to bitch about rejection letters? Write your own novel”. _

_ The day he almost hit her, they agreed to a divorce; all the perfection in the world is not worth this chafing. When they noticed Mycroft watching- all of five years old- they agreed to wait until he could understand a bit more.  _

_ The next two years were spent in relative peace after that; the love portion of their marriage was long over, and the official separation had yet to begin. All they could do now was to make sure Mycroft grew up right (which they disagreed on and had many heated arguments over at night when the boy was on his own floor and cold hour long conversations via text during the day, as unintrusive, razor sharp children see and hear far more than they should) and prepare for the legalities. _

_ When Mycroft was seven, they sat him down and told him the truth (he already knew it). _

_ When Mycroft was nine, they were officially separated.  _

_ Also when Mycroft was eight, his mother met a businessman with a thick beard and charming eyes and the same craving for perfection, though perhaps not as strong as he thirst for control. Mycroft could tell that they were more than friends. He could tell that, in any other situation, this would be wrong. But his parents had been divorced in mind if not in body for three years by this point, and there was nothing his father could have done about it, had he been inclined to be angry (he wasn’t. He had also met a nice man). _

_ At some point there were movers, and then Mycroft spent time travelling between two fine houses, riding in two sets of fine cars, and sleeping in two fine beds when he wasn’t at boarding school. _

_ When Mycroft was ten, his mother grew fat at the belly again and thought thoughts about brilliance and sagacity. The boy sat in his room most of the time, doing homework or reading about one thing or another. Seven months and twenty nine days in, he was brought to the library from a sitting room by a loud, pained cry.  _

_ His mother knelt on the floor, clutching her growing stomach, the floor beneath her wet with with fluid. The new baby was early, and the new man who had sired him gone for the month. It was up to Mycroft, then. He felt in the back pocket of his trousers for his cell and dialed 999. _

_ Twenty three hours later, a premature baby laid in an incubator, his mother rested in a hospital bed, and Mycroft stood torn between seeing his mum and the babe. Well, his mum would not like him to see her like this: sweaty and unconscious and ugly and imperfect. He tugged on a nurses sleeve to get her attention and was, with some delay, taken to the incubator, where a blotchy skinned, fair-haired, tiny scrap of a babe was asleep in his little bubble of bedding and plastic.  _

_ This was his brother. This was… _

_ “You know, a name hasn’t been given to him yet,” the nurse said, looking down contemplatively at the copper haired boy and his and his fair haired brother. _

_ “No, he hasn’t,” Mycroft said. _

_ “What would you name him?” she asked. Mycroft cocked his head to the side and, for thirty seconds, went through all the names he had ever heard of, ever read of, ever invented. _

_ “Sherlock,” he says at last. _

_ “Oh, love, that’s not a very good name.” Mycroft gave her a look, turned from the incubator, and left. _

_ Sherlock was, indeed, the name given to the baby, and it was what Mycroft called out softly when he held his brother’s hand through the incubator for the first time, and it was the name he would always think of whenever his brother came to mind.  _

_ All of this I learned later- years later, in fact. Some of it I had figured out along the way.  _

_ My mother and father married when it was clear I would live, and things were, according to Mycroft, peaceful for a time. Then, unfortunately, there was the problem of my less than functional tendencies. _

_ She had wanted perfection, and she had wanted extraordinary talent. She wasn’t prepared for and would not accept anything else. So when I had trouble socializing, I was a slow boy. When I couldn’t stand to be touched, I was dramatic. When I didn’t take the punishment of my father well, I was just stubborn.  _

_ If I did something successfully, it wasn’t good enough. If it was average, it was a failure, and if I actually failed, it was an abomination and blight on the Holmes name. _

_ Eventually, they sent me away, and I was better for a time. Then that stopped working, so they had me commited. I’ve been out since the summer before school started _

 

…

 

Sherlock stopped talking, throat dry, secrets divulged.

“So you see, I do not wish to go, and you cannot come with me.”

“Yes… I do.” John says, and, with some thought, carefully laid his arm across Sherlock’s shoulders, “and I know I’ve never lived with your mother, but I think I get it.” Sherlock wriggles closer until all that stops them from touching are two heavy blankets to ward off the eternal chill of the dormitories.

“I am glad.” John does not mention it, but he knows there’s something else there; the end of the story was just to short for anything else. But he lets it go. Sherlock will tell him when he’s ready. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. Sorry it's been so long. Let me know what you guys think:)


	12. Going Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock goes back to his family's estate

John woke to an alarm clock, and he didn’t see Sherlock. His chest sinks. Right. Sherlock’s at his family’s home for the holidays. John is stuck here as one of the few students who do not, in fact, have a place to go to (or really, any better place to go to, if he’s being honest).

For a moment, he just lays in bed, as if, by some miracle, Sherlock will stroll in, cheeks red and fingers frozen from having them out in the cold, the smell of cigarettes already hidden under mint gum.  But he doesn’t, and John’s got two long weeks before he comes back, and he knows he should be happy- now is the time to get in extra work and studying, after all- but he misses his only friend. 

Curiously enough, he starts to feel some sort of… pseudo-emotion in his chest, almost as though… oh. He’s feeling what Sherlock is feeling. He calms down a bit. He didn’t realize that the necklace he gave Sherlock could and would translate emotion. Probably should have done a little more research. 

Well, whatever Sherlock’s doing right now, he doesn’t like it. Waves of nervousness and dislike run through John before fading out all together. He’s either calm or he took off the necklace.

The older of the two boys sits up, swings his pajama clad legs over the bed, and goes about getting dressed. Time for breakfast.

 

…

 

Sherlock walks around his old room, looking at all the things he’d left behind. It bothers him that someone had been in to deep clean at least once. Someone had been handling what had once been precious to him.

The door, locked behind him, used to signify safety; somewhere in the back of his mind, he’d believed, as a small child, that a locked door was an insurmountable obstacle; that only when it is unlocked do the bad things happen. 

The gilded handle with small etchings winks at him. Hah. Insurmountable indeed. He sets about unpacking in that meticulous way he has of moving things around. When his suitcase is empty, he sits on the large, comfortable bed and looks around at his room’s navy and white color scheme, the lilac accents of the wallpaper design and the bed drawing the eye.

A knock sounds. He wishes it hadn’t.

“Sherlock? Mum is looking for you.” Sherlock stands up and opens the door.

“Mycroft.”

“Cornelius will be here soon. Mother would like you to look… presentable.”

“What? School uniform not hiding the… what would she call it? Inadequacies well enough?”

“Don’t be like that.”

“I’ll be like whatever I want to.”

“For just once, could you act your age?”

“Not a chance. You should see the other boys my age. Heathens, everyone of them. Irrational, illogical, stupid.” Sherlock turns back to his room to pick out clothes.

“Look, Sherlock. No one’s saying that you aren’t good enough.”

“My short comings are what landed me in Cornelius’ arms in the first place.”

“... what did he do?” 

“Nothing,” he says without so much as a hair of hesitation.

“He clearly did something.”

“Nothing is short for nothing I’m going to tell you.”

“Look, just stay quiet. The faster we get through this, the faster you can make up some excuse to leave.” Mycroft says as he leans in the doorway.

“Fine. Now, get out. I need to change. Wouldn’t want to be indecent, after all.” his brother leaves, and Sherlock pulls out his phone.

 

These people make me want to die. -SH

 

What are they doing? -JW

 

Mum is crowing over what a good little human I am. -SH

 

Lol fr? -JW

 

Yeah. Had Mycroft tell me to change so I’d look it, too. -SH

 

She actually said that shit? -JW

 

She implied it. -SH

 

Ah. -JW

 

What are you doing now? -SH

 

About to get dressed. It’s cold as balls in here, though. -JW

 

So’s my family. -SH

 

Who’s doing what? -JW

 

Well father’s strutting around like he single-handedly fixed me. Mycroft is scheming to keep people’s throats from being gone at, and mum is watching for any signs of the crazy. -SH

 

Hope ur a good actor. -JW

 

I am. -SH

 

As Sherlock waits for John’s text back, he strips his trousers and pulls on a new pair of slacks and toes into a new pair of shoes (tan, this time around). A fitted waistcoat goes over his crisp white school shirt.

 

R u nervous? -JW

 

Little bit. -SH

 

I’m sorry. -JW

 

I can tell. -SH

 

He dons a black tie and tucks it in.

 

Talk to you later. I have asshats to troll. -SH

 

The boy slides a suit jacket onto his shoulders, and the phone into the inside pocket. He checks his hair in the mirror- to long, as always- before descending downstairs, ready to cause enough problems that no one will be keen to have him back again.

He joins what family is here- his mother and father, Mycroft, and Lettie Bridle, one of Sherlock’s more… esteemed aunts, to say the least. As tea is passed around, Sherlock settles for staring off into space, daring anyone to bother him. That he was full paying attention was lost to all but Mycroft.

Just then, the doorbell rings, and, presently a maid brings in Cornelius Holmes.

“It is good to see you all again.” Dread twists in Sherlock’s stomach. He hates this man.


	13. The Family Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft begins to remember what Sherlock was like.

Christmas comes and goes with Sherlock spending the entire time splayed out in a chair, reclined just enough to appear relaxed, pale eyes watching everything and everyone. No one talks to him. Not when a game of poker starts up in the sitting room he’s taken to haunting. Not when dinner is served and he elects to wait until later. Not even when Mycroft manages to get him to come perch in an arm chair in the livingroom and open his presents.

In the times when he’s released to do his own thing, he practices his violin behind the locked door of his room, eyes nearly closed, the scales and various “comfort” songs sliding effortlessly into the air. He takes extremely long showers in one of the bathrooms on his floor at opportune times to not join the family at breakfast. Or lunch. Or whenever the houseguest he’s trying to avoid is at his best.

Eventually Mycroft stumbles upon a way to interact with the Holme’s cantankerous black sheep. In the sitting room on their floor- not the one Sherlock normally frequents, is a lovely grand piano. When they were little, and the storms had woken up a one-year-old Sherlock and Mycroft had been obliged to tend to him, it was to this place that he went. It has two outside walls, and is in the back of the house (closer to Sherlock’s room than Mycroft’s).

Sometimes, it would take hours to coax his baby brother back to sleep. Sometimes the day would dawn with the rain still pelting the glass and morning light would spill over a sleeping eight year old and his wide eyed, observant sibling.

It is to this place, with a fire crackling in the hearth against the back wall and the piano resting proud and shiny under the adjacent window, that Mycroft goes now. He runs a smooth hand over the lid. Imagines the immaculately kept keys underneath. How white they look against the black lacquer. How lovely the notes would flow if it was, indeed, in tune. If not, well, he could do that too.

He raises the heavy covering, takes a seat, and quickly runs through his scales, first at one end, then at the other. The deep tinkling of “What a Wonderful World” is what eventually draws Sherlock out of his room. He plays a couple more songs, and, when he’s sure the year nine is ready, switches to classical. 

After a moment, the violin joins in again.

At this moment, Mycroft is in his third year at uni.

At this moment, they are a year removed from Sherlock’s extended stay with Cornelius Holmes. He is not their brother, but he may as well be for all he looks like the spitting image of Sherlock, only about twenty years older.

It’s a beautiful, fast paced, yet calm thing that flows from the two brothers; like the steady, methodical pace of a professional runner. Mycroft can see that, out of the corner of his eye, Sherlock has positioned himself so that he cannot be snuck up on. 

He swears, right then and there, that he will figure out what happened between him and Cornelius. And he knows something happened. He remembers, as a bystander in family affairs, what it looked like. 

 

…

 

Sherlock was ten. He was having problems. Lots and lots of problems. It was more than behavioral difficulties. The boy could barely step out of the house without being overwhelmed. Could barely hold a conversation. Could barely do any of the things that normal people do with ease, nevermind hold over them the same mastery befitting and, indeed, required of a Holmes.

His- Sherlock’s, not his- father was in a constant state of embarrassment. His little boy- his cherubic, handsome little boy- was a waste of space; he wasn’t even worth the humanity that even the dullest of children get. This could not go on, of course. It was clear that the littlest Holmes was a genius in the making, but he couldn’t harness his mind or any other. The condition needed reversing. Needed… Fixing. 

Yes, Fixing with a capital “F”, because that’s what it became known as. Sherlock this close to a meltdown? Fix it, Mycroft. He’s your brother. You should know how to Fix him. Sherlock fallen and scraped his knee and was picking at the scabs? Fix it, Mycroft. Take his bad habits, and Fix them. Sherlock refusing to eat again? Go and Fix it.

With this problem as the backdrop and the black sheep and the foremost problem of all their lives, Sherlock’s father (Not Mycroft’s. Never Mycroft’s. That one is the other black mark in the Holme’s collective ledger. The only difference is he stays in the past), came home and said that Sherlock would be going away for a while. Where? To his cousin’s, of course. If he could not be Fixed here, then they would see if he could be Fixed elsewhere, starting with Cornelius Holmes.

Something distinctly sour settled in his gut at the news, and Mycroft could taste it on the back of his tongue. But Mycroft was just 17; his graduation was right around the corner. He had things to do, places to go, people to see, and he could not stay at home. As the only person who had ever been able to Fix Sherlock, his inevitable absence from the family home would rob Sherlock’s father and their mother from maintaining their own respective and joint spheres of control.

He had not a single leg to stand on in this argument. It would be better to save his breath and his resources for any future problems that might crop up. So when the news was broken to him to go tell Sherlock, he did not fight it. Instead, he turned on one well polished heel and headed up stairs to where Sherlock was sitting on his floor, drawing. For once, he was quiet and peaceful. 

Mycroft did not tell him this thing that was to happen right then. Instead, he just sat next to him and stared off into the distance to the tranquil backdrop of scritching and evening light. The next day, with just under two months- a week before Mycroft’s graduation- before Sherlock would be leaving, freeing the elder brother up for Uni, he wanted to do something special.

He needed to give Sherlock a parting gift he could use. 

The sort of gift that would require Alone Time, which the little boy needed in copious amounts. The sort of gift that, in time, would be a powerful card in his arsenal, should he ever need to build such a thing. 

So, as Sherlock drew, and Mycroft thought, one thing stuck in his mind: music. People love it. Whether it’s pop songs or classical, people. Love. Music. Love the idea of musicians. Love the idea of a cute, chubby faced, talented little boy, sitting so primly in his chair, spinning sweet notes out into the air. 

They love the idea. 

Sherlock has the mind to make it happen. 

Three days later, when Sherlock’s father and their mother was both out of the house on a business trip that would take them the weekend, Mycroft put his plan into effect. while Mycroft watched over his brother. 

When they came back, it was to the sounds of the scales being played over and over on the strings of a small violin. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you think and I'm sorry this is late.


	14. Behaving Badly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft and Harry have small bits of anarchy.

They play all through dinner. Mycroft isn’t hungry anyways. Sherlock hardly ever is. The elder will tag along when he goes to eat later. As Sherlock withdraws to his room again, the little sitting room where they spent many a storm is invaded by another presence. This one is smaller in stature; more brittle. Behind her, a taller form comes in. They stand behind Mycroft as he plays a tinkling, slow tune.

“I wish you would do something about him,” his mother says.

“I did. We played together.”

“He refuses to socialize. This is his family,” his mother’s husband points out, clearly frustrated. “It’s unacceptable.”

“His own family couldn’t be arsed to care about or for him when he needed it. You cannot expect him to show love for you now.”

“We loved him,” they argue.

“You discarded him,” he rejoins, copper eyebrow cocked as he closes the lid of the piano and stands up.

“He was out of control. You were going away. What did you expect?”

“I’m not talking about then. You abandoned him a long time ago,” Mycroft runs a last hand over his long-missed piano before he turns on his heel and regards his mother and his mother’s husband with cold, calculating eye.

“If you had wanted him to act like family, you probably should have treated him better.” Mycroft moves to leave, only to have his path blocked.

“He was ill, and you won’t speak to your mum like that.”

“As I said before, you all had the presence of mind to abandon him when he was merely difficult. You can hardly reverse it now that he’s older, and wiser, than he was before.” He is almost out of the room when he remembers something.

“I wouldn’t try and force him to do anything either. You’ve already got a cunning lad on your hands. Wouldn’t want to see him turn malicious, would you?” Mycroft let the door shut silently, blue eyes locking with Sherlock’s where he leaned quietly against the door, mutinous and stony expression directed upwards before he pushed off the wall and stalked away. Mycroft smirked.

Good job he got to hear that one. Few in this family would stand with Sherlock Holmes.

 

…

 

John has been up to no good. Or rather, John has been up to no good with Harry. They decide to Run Away for a week (Harry’s got money saved up). At sixteen (Almost seventeen, John. That means I make the rules), Harry is bored out of her mind at her aunt’s house, and she’s ready to have some fun. She’s ready to get out for winter. But with the unfortunance with their father, her options for friends and for fun were, at the start of the two week holiday, slim to none.

Then one of her old friends called (one of the ones who didn’t fuck off when they realized Harry was gay) and said she and some of her people (whom Harry does not know and so can’t judge her based on past revelations) are staying in a hotel and would Harry like to come? Only if she can bring her kid brother, Harry had answered. So she had called John, and John had packed his bag. John is a minotaur. He can protect her.

So they Run Away to some shit motel where they won’t call the law on a bunch of rowdy kids with liquor and weed and a good sound system that plays shit music. It’s partially because there are lots of bored kids in lots of crappy rooms, and it’s also because this place is highly questionable on it’s own and nobody gets paid enough to be having the cops stomp around arresting people and handcuffing them against beds with strange stains and red crushed bed bugs.

Harry’s friend is a tall 17 (almost eighteen, John. She knows what she’s doing) who pulls Harry into a hug and introduces her to three other girls (two 17s, one of which is just barely over 16, and an 18) with holy jeans that are slung low on prominent hips (iliac crests, John’s mind supplies) and layered undershirt and crop top that look a little dingy. Her makeup is on point, though.

Her friends are dressed similarly (so is Harry, for that matter.) and they have metal in their ears, eyebrows, noses, and lips and know to check the mattresses for bed bugs before they set their things down. They’ve got fishnets and high heels and dark eyeshadow and big coats that reveal little outfits. They lock the door behind the two guests.

The friend pulls Harry onto her lap and settles hands onto hips.

“This is- oh, stop it, hehe- Mila, John.”

“And Sienna, Masie, and the short stack’s Andrea.”

“I cap you at the knees and you’ll be the short stack, arsehole.” (that one, by the way, has more leather and big shit kickers and stud bracelets. John thinks he likes her.

“Right. Well, you’ll be sitting on my lap next, once we make with the liquor,” Mila cheekily offers up. John takes a seat on the bed next to Andrea and waits.

As he watches, Mila rubs over the parts of Harry she can reach, teasing and already a little drunk. They pass around the alcohol (it’s not all liquor. In fact, most of it isn’t) and the first blunt of the night and John thinks about saying no.

No, he has to be responsible.

No, he can’t lose control.

But these are Harry’s only friends, and if she brings her kid brother and the brother doesn’t go with it, they might not want her back.

She might be friendless because of John.

So he takes a very small sip and when he puffs on the joint he doesn’t breathe deep. They’ve got food here, too. Mostly candy and chips and soda and crackers. John eats the crackers and drinks sprite while they experiment and get high.

After four hours, they’re down three bottles and four blunts and John’s only just now feeling anything because he’s been eating and very light with the blunt but they haven’t and Harry’s curled into Mila again (briefly, she made her way to Andrea’s hands so that the second shortest member of the group could play with Harry’s silky blond hair) and the two are almost asleep and wide awake on the bed (John has migrated to a corner).

The other two girls have already dropped off into oblivion and John knows they’ll wake up horny and hungry as hell and he’ll probably be cleaning something up so he takes another sip of-

“God, John, you gonna stay sober all night?” Harry says from where she’s turned over in Mila’s arms to look at him with a hazy, sleepy gaze.

John takes another drink of beer (it takes like fizzy piss).

“Good lad…”

The next morning, they’ve got headaches and sour mouths and hangovers and the munchies. They eat and they find more shit and they do this for four days. Somewhere along the way, they forget that John isn’t drinking anything. He does, however, get a bit high off the fumes. On friday, he and Harry take showers to wash away the stink and change into their last sets of clothes. John sneaks her back into their aunt’s place and then goes back to the boarding school. He showers again and hides the backpack in plastic bag so he can wash it later.

Then, he falls onto a bed and sleeps- really sleeps- for hours and hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me what you guys think. I've never written "gaggle of high teenage girls before" despite being a teenage girl.


	15. Sharp Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John, once again, does his duty.

John is asleep the first time he feels it. Without really thinking about it, he bolts straight up in bed, is out the door and near the gap in the fence by the time he really wakes up. There, he just flows into the act of running until the city grows up like a mechanical monster from the ground and he’s being guided through specific streets until he finds his way to another shitty little motel and up to another shitty little room with drunk kids with one stereo and ten different bottles of alcohol.

He opens the door (why is it unlocked?). Sherlock is passed out on the floor, his one suitcase safely out of the way of the darkest and most noxious of liquids. His button down is open down to his chest. Hickies stand out like dark rose petals all up and down his neck and his nice slacks are open a bit.

At John’s entrance, every eye in the room turns to him. There’s six of them in this room, now. He liked it better when the amount of people he didn’t know was three. Angry at Sherlock’s prone state, John moves without hesitation towards his friend.

“Aye, mate, wot are you doing?” Wordlessly, John reveals his necklace- one of the only trappings of his human form he kept on him- and then fishes around until he can show them Sherlock’s. One of the men chokes. He’s at least thirty.

“Aye, we didn’t know you was his keeper, yeah?” John cups Sherlock’s face in one hand and examines him for possible injuries. He moves to button up his trousers.

“It’s all good, innit?” one of the others asks. John doesn’t answer as he grabs Sherlock’s suitcase and slings up the boy himself over one shoulder.

“Answer me, mate.”

“I don’t know.” John says. The man, he can tell, is getting desperate. John notices that, near a spot that his friend might have slept is an unmanned glass of liquid. He picks it up and smells it. Nothing. He sticks his long, pink tongue.

Occasionally, normal drugs stand out like beacons to supernatural senses, and here is one such case. Something bitter and foul entirely apart from the alcohol spreads across John’s tongue. He makes a noise of disgust waves his hand, disappearing the plastic cup.

“Aye, mate, answer me!”

“I’ll see when he wakes up, yeah?” sensing that the situation is about to get real hairy, John disappears into thin air and walks out of the door, a drugged boy in one arm and a suitcase in another. 

“What the fuck were you thinking?” John says. It’s not an exclamation. He’s not even all that angry. John is just worried. His da started out like that- being out all night and sleeping all day until he didn’t have a choice and chose to take it out on his kids. His mum started out like that. Out all day and sleeping all night until she vanished into thin air, abandoning her children. 

If there’s one thing John knows, it’s that the substance is always more important. It scares him, now, how, for the second time in the space of a week, he’s been to two different places watching over two different people. Somewhere in his little boy’s heart, he feels his world start to break again.

“Wanted to forget.” Sherlock says, freshly washed and curled up in his bed in their dorms (John snuck them back in again), his curls air drying on top of a towel, eyes closed, blanket up to his shoulders.

“Forget what?” Sherlock makes a small, vague hand motion. 

“It all.”

“Sherlock…”

“Just because your family got addicted doesn’t mean I will, so stop projecting. It’s irritating,” the other boy suddenly snaps, voice flat and hard. John shuts his mouth. He lowers his head a bit to look at his bare toes and dirty clothes, dreadlocks falling in his face. Sherlock has no reason to say that. He has no reason to just… blurt it out. John’s thin mouth tightens, muscles becoming visible, brows drawing together.

“Fine.”

They don’t talk for the rest of the night.

Or the next day.

Or the day after that.

The school semester begins and they still don’t talk. Sherlock is too proud to notify the school about the emails the other students still send but he reads them anyways; memorizes them. John is too proud to tell Sherlock how much his comment about his family hurt and he’s too proud to let it die so the words sit like a banked fire between them; providing nothing but the threat of an inferno, should it be stoked to life incorrectly. 

Life, in a sense, goes on much the way it did before.

When John is needed, he is there. When he isn’t, he’s not. That’s all there is to it, and it hurts Sherlock. Never before has any relationship been so poignant. Mycroft, in one of their last days together, had once used the phrase “the art of relationships”. They were out on the veranda, Sherlock twisting a rubik's cube over and over again, making the colors line up and fall apart like a cuboidal fractal in slow motion. Mycroft was sitting with one ankle resting on his knee, khaki colored suit and tan dress shoes coloring a fine picture over the dark wood and gentle red of the shaded porch and wicker rocking chairs. 

He had said, Sherlock recalls now, that the art of relationships is a tricky and delicate one, and it is never easy to tell when things have been broken beyond repair.

Sherlock thinks what he has- had, he chides- with John is art. That maybe he just screwed up with the colors and maybe he can make it right.

But he doesn’t know how. He sits up late into the night researching, trying to match what the internet says with what he knows.

It takes a while- a week, in fact, but he thinks he figures it out. 

One tuesday afternoon, when the grass is just beginning to green and the winds are wet and cold still, he goes to the roof of the school, where he knows John hangs out by himself. 

Thin wisps of cigarette smoke rise above a blond head and are snatched away by heavy draughts. Sherlock can’t see his face but he knows it’s solemn. John is always solemn. Even when he’s laughing, he never forgets the serious things. 

Sherlock draws abreast to him, anxiety twisting in the pit of his stomach and his hands clenching from more than the cold.

“What?” John asks, dragging hard on the thin cigarette and blowing the smoke out of his nose.

“I mentioned your family because I didn’t want you to think about mine.”

“You could have said that.”

“But it wouldn’t have achieved anything. You would have just kept it to yourself.”

“But you can’t make people not think.”

“I wish I could.”

“Yeah,” John mumbles. “Me, too.”

“Not so long ago… I had a lot of… problems.” John doesn’t say anything, just drops the butt, crushes it under his loafer, and takes out another. He offers a third to Sherlock. It’s a struggle to light them, but it’s okay, cause maybe this will work.

“What happened?” Sherlock tips his head back, curls tugged out by the wind. 

“They sent me away.”

 


	16. Not That Sorry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock tells John what happened between him and his relative

“To Cornelius’?”

“Yeah. He has his own house, you know. It’s a big place… lots of space, really. It was nice. There was no one there. Just me and all that quiet. Things were never like that at my mum and dad’s.”

“What was it like over there?”

“Cold. I mean, Mycroft was there, of course, but it seemed like every time I turned around someone was watching me, waiting for me to prove how much a freak I am. Or to prove that I was faking it the whole time.”

“And Mycroft?”

“He never pushed me to stop faking, but he knew things I didn’t, and he wanted me to learn to hide stuff, or to do it in a way that made our parents stop watching.”

“Why would he want that?”

“They were gonna have me commited. It seemed like every day there was more impatience. Every family member I saw looked down their nose at me. At me and at my parents for having such a freak of a child.

“Mum couldn’t stand it. She was great at doing stuff like socializing. Mycroft said that she and da could control the room from the staircase or a couch. He described them as ‘masters at their craft’ and said that they were perfectionists.

“He told me that they had decided that I should be perfect because I would be theirs. They wanted me. But they didn’t want the me they got. And they could have decided Mycroft should be the perfect one, but my father is not his father. He reminded them of mum’s failure.

“I thought Mycroft was perfect to them.” He had heard something of the like from Sherlock before. 

“He is, but his lineage gets in the way of “true” perfection. But that’s another story. In any case, she couldn’t stand me, so she tried to fix me herself. She couldn’t fix me, so she tried to get Mycroft to do it. Mycroft loves too much and bends too little for her, so she sent me away to Cornelius’, cause he supposedly had some problems as a kid, too.

“The funny thing is she was right. It was good for me. There wasn’t anybody watching me anymore. It was just me out there fucking around all day in the trees bordering the property or the library or the part of the basement Cornelius said I could do experiments in. 

“Originally, I thought I could stay there forever. He even bought me a chemistry set, but he said he didn’t trust me enough to not monitor me when I was dealing with chemicals. Usually he just sat near  my work table.

“He was a photographer; he had award winning images all over the internet and what not, and he made a lot of money doing professional photo shoots. He’d leave at, like, seven and come back around two or three. Or he would have a driver bring me to him. He liked to go though antique shops and flea markets to look for things to collect. 

“He’d have me sit in the car, and I think the goal was to get me used to seeing people a lot, even if I wasn’t interacting with them. A few months of that- just patience and waiting, and I was ready to go into the less busy shops and what not.

“One day he said ‘Sherlock, come here. Take this picture with me.’ and I did.” Now, Sherlock has his phone out, scrolling through some app or another as John waits. Finally, he turns the screen so that John can see a selfie with an adult version of Sherlock, plus his younger self. Sherlock looked at peace in a way he only seems to be when he’s sleeping.

“I think mum wanted him to do it because it showed up on his facebook feed with the caption ‘just settling in with my nephew!’. After that, there were more. Some of them were selfies, but a lot of them would be candid shots or posed ones. It took me a while to realize he was doing an entire collection. He was going to make money off me.”

“Was he?”

“Yeah. I didn’t like it. After that I wouldn’t wear anything he wanted me to wear, or I found a way to ruin it. Then it was like a game. I do this shot, and I get an hour of lab time. At first I wanted to say no, but then he started taking away other stuff. I couldn’t play with the erector set Mycroft had sent as a gift. I couldn’t even go see Mycroft (now I hardly saw him anyways, but it was the can’t that made it bad). I couldn’t go wander around outside. Couldn’t get on the internet. Couldn’t use my own damn phone.

“The more he wanted, the worse it got, the harder I fought.”

“And your mum didn’t stop this?”

“No. She didn’t know for the most part. I was twelve when I went to live with Cornelius, and mum wanted to see if those nice pictures on facebook had any truth to them.” Sherlock pauses here to light another cigarette. 

“They threw a party for me, and I was home for the first time, and Mycroft couldn’t make it. I didn’t find out until later that no one told him anything at all about it, so he didn’t know. I was sitting in a chair, and they asked me to play- that’s the one thing Cornelius didn’t take away, by the way. Violin was the only thing my mum approved of, so it was the only thing I was allowed to do. 

“So I was playing, and it was going to be something soft, and nice, but it came out all intense and angry. Later, she asked me what was wrong, and I told her what my uncle was doing, and she told me to stop being dramatic, and that Cornelius is just practicing my art, and that he would never do that to a family member.”

“I had been homeschooled for nearly a year at that point, and, while there were classroom message boards I could have contacted people through, he was always watching.” Sherlock gets quieter with each passing fact, and John is tempted to hug him. He holds off, though. This is not the right time.

“Then what happened.”

“He wanted stranger and stranger shots. Me in a full wedding-style tuxedo standing on a rock in the middle of a little pond, with koi all around. Me half naked, running around the trees with no shoes on. It seemed like giving him what he wanted only made him want more, and not giving him what he wanted just made him mad. 

“Then what happened?” 

“I broke his camera one night. He smacked me so hard I can still feel it. Then he kicked me twice. I ran, and he tried to follow, but I knew how to bar a door. I was so mad at him for-” he chokes here, takes a pull on his fag, closes his eyes.

“For what?”

“He wanted me entirely naked, in make up, with flowers, like a fairy, looking into the camera. I don’t think you would have been able to see my privates, but it was just the idea…”

“In any case, I ran away with my lab journal and my violin and a backpack full of clothes. My room was on the second floor but I knew how to get down. Mycroft had given me money and told me to keep it well hidden in case things went bad. I think even then he knew better than to trust family.”

“In any case, I knew where my old address was. I ran until I found the road into town, and they I stayed well back from the road even as I followed it. He drove by in his car, looking, but I was concealed in the woods on either side, so he couldn’t find me. 

“It took well over a day, but I got out of a cab and stood in front of the door to my family’s house. Cornelius’ car was already there. He must have guessed I’d come back. Funny thing is, he said he’d give me my phone if I cooperated with him, and I had taken to recording shit with it. 

“He’d already taken one picture, so it was in my pocket and I was playing with it when he went to get the makeup. So when he told mum that I had just thrown a little tantrum and he didn’t mean to lose control like that, it was easy to expose him.

“I was good for them, after I moved back home. I finally got what Mycroft had tried to teach me. Sometimes, you just have to pretend you’re alright to get out. After three months of no problems, they asked if I wanted to go to private school, and I said yes.”

“I’m sorry, Sherlock.”

“You know what, John? Me, too.” sherlock turned his head to look at John where they the other boy was gazing out at the night sky.

“But not as sorry as I could have been.” Now, the blond turns to meet a piercing silver gaze. After a moment, Sherlock moves a bit closer, and John lets him. One more step, and their meeting in the middle to share a kiss of cigarette smoke and frosty night air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys so much for your patience.


	17. Presentation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We see what Sherlock is, and the next part of their life comes upon them.

They don’t tell anyone what they’ve gotten up to with each other. In fact, most of their relationship is exactly the same. It’s just that, sometimes, well, when Sherlock climbs into John’s bed, it isn’t because he can’t sleep.

The year ends like that, and Sherlock goes back to the apartment his brother keeps him in with John in tow, and then they go back into another year of school together. Another year of hands intertwining in the dark. Another year of stealing kisses and giggling at the madness that is them.

They fight, of course, but it’s okay. It’s all okay.

Curiously, it’s not Sherlock’s mercurial moods that break them up. It begins like this:

When John is 16, Harry turns 18, and she takes up with a couple friends who split the rent for a flat. When John is 17, Harry is 19, and he spends his first night with in a hospital, waiting for his sister to wake up. That summer, she presents as a siren, just like their mum.

When John is 18, Harry is 20, and he spends his second night waiting in the hospital, and, this time, Sherlock is at liberty to go with him. He doesn’t stay at liberty though.

Some hours in, he is called away for his own family emergency, and then is obliged to return to school an hour or so earlier than John is. That hour turns into three or four, so that, by the time John leaves the hospital, it is maybe eleven in the evening, and he’s just a young boy a semester away from graduation, possessing magic but looking all the world like he doesn’t.

He stands there, trying to hail a cab, hoping that maybe he’ll get lucky. He doesn’t want to take the train, and he is too drained to just fly. Sherlock hasn’t needed him as much lately. He’s a bit weaker than normal, and he’s been standing vigil. Without a positive change though, he gets no energy from that, either. 

He shakes his head and turns to make his way to the closest station. His dreads swing a bit as he walks. The wind is cold and sharp and makes his ears hurt. It’s freezing out here- cold enough that he bunches his shoulders around his neck and zips his jacket all the way up.

His nose is red, and he sniffs snot back into it on occasion. His eyes are squinted against the frozen arrows. His lips are pursed against the cold.

He does not see them. He does not hear them. He does not even know they’re there until he is hit with a force from the side. John, alone at the mouth of the train station, lands on his shoulder and struggles to get back up. 

He suffers another kick to the side. A blow to his head and another to his stomach. Magic is used to hold him down and, try as he might, he cannot muster up a spell against them. He’s so drained that it hurts him to even think about spells, so he just shuts his eyes because he’s so, so tired, and he has no money, so there’s nothing they could take from him. 

“John!” he hears, and then groans, because Sherlock ought to be back in their dorm, waiting. He ought to be in his mind palace, or asleep, or up on the roof smoking a fag because he never really broke that habit. He ought not be here.

“Go away!” he yells, turning to look. He suffers a cut on his cheekbone. The group- he realizes numbly that these boys used to torment his friend, used to torment him before they graduated no, wait, they were expelled)- turns and attacks the non-magical boy.

The don’t hurt him, of course- wouldn’t want to give John any strength. They do, however, hold Sherlock down so that they can continue their ministrations.

“Leave him alone!” Sherlock yells out, voice growing more horse by the moment. 

In that moment, two things happen:

Firstly, they kick John in just the right spot, and the boy lets out a roar that reverberates through the entire empty station. Secondly, Sherlock breaks free and bites one on the neck, another he scratches across the face hard enough to draw blood, and a third suffers a kick to the groin that likely ruptures an organ or three.

It’s only been a moment, but John realizes that Sherlock’s skin is really paling before him. That Sherlock’s teeth are really growing. That Sherlock’s eyes really are that glow-y. When it’s all said and done, John is looking at a lone, hungry vampire, and he knows he cannot let him drain any of their attackers.

If that happens, they’ll never see each other again.

“Sher… Sherlock,” John calls, pushing himself to sit up against the cold wall. The new vampire, wild with the need to feed, looks hard at John.

“Come… come take a bit, yeah? Then we’ll get you to the A&E.” they boy, wild in this newfound magical state, draws closer, sinks on one knee, and takes a wrist in his hand. First he sniffs it, then he moves up John’s arm to spread out over the rest of him.

To keep his balance, he sets a hand down on the other side of John’s leg while he touches ever so delicately at the split lip and the bruised eye and the many other injuries John’s going to become fully aware of. 

He sniffs all across John’s chest and face and neck, until he’s satisfied that this is indeed his friend. He goes back to the offered vein and, fast as lightning bite and begins to drink. John sighs as he makes himself stay still, sighs as he can feel the magic he gets by helping Sherlock flow into him.

Feeding a starving vampire gains him enough magical fuel to transform into a minotaur so that Sherlock can take a bit more. It’s not enough- not for a fledgling- but it works to put Sherlock to sleep so that he can finish adjusting to the magic. 

They boy’s curls rest on John’s shoulder, and he stares at his wrist, which Sherlock instinctively licked, as the blood stops remarkably fast.

When he’s sure Sherlock is asleep, he carefully rises, boy in hand, and heads for their flat, where he knows Miss Hudson will open the door for them.

 

…

 

The next morning, a week’s supply of blood is on their doorstep. John reads the directions on the back of the bag (warm via boiling for ten minutes, DO NOT MICROWAVE) and sets about making Sherlock three bags for his first full meal. The other boy is still asleep. He’s lightheaded though, especially since he’s been letting Sherlock drink off him all night.

He hits the floor hard.

 

…

 

When he wakes up, it’s with a redheaded man kneeling next to him.

“Really boy, you have got to know where your limits are.” Magic as red as blood lights up his palms when he pulls them away.

“Mycroft.” 

“John.”

“Is Sherlock...?”

“Asleep, and full. I need to speak with you on something urgent.”

“What is it?”

“The family has long been associated with a very old, very powerful coven of vampires. As you know, Sherlock is not family in the traditional sense. From what I can tell, our mother and his father will seek to normalize him by putting his training in their hands. In addition to that, they will break you up, likely by calling whoever is in charge of your case and informing them that you are ready and no longer needed.

"Sherlock’s only way to survive with much of his mind intact is to play along until he has the control to go rogue. I need you to keep him calm, let him know it will be okay. He does not have anyone but you in his life to fill the roll you do. In fact, if I could, I would keep the two of you together. I am not, however in charge of Sherlock’s well being. I can only move things behind the scenes and hope."

“You want me to prepare him.”

“And yourself. The road he has to walk is long and hard, and I cannot guarantee either of your happiness. Do you understand?” Did he? All of it? No. But he knows how family is, how they can push you until you can’t stand and then step on your fingers and knees to make it hard to crawl.

“Yes.” he says, because that’s what he ought to do, and he knows that, with a bit of luck, they’ll see each other again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second to last chapter! let me know what you guys think!

**Author's Note:**

> UPDATE 1.6.2017: My fandom blog is here, and if you see something you'd like written, go ahead and ask me.
> 
> https://whosefandomisitanyways.tumblr.com/


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